Fidelio at the Met. Karita Mattila sang Leonore’s role gorgeously, and she was impressively spry as Fidelio, too, scampering around the stage with boyish aplomb, scooting up and down ladders, bearing groceries. Apart from the limpid quartet in the opening act and the arpeggiated vocal mountaineering of the ‘Abscheulicher!’ duet in the final act, it […]
Also filed in Film, Love, Music, Philosophy
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Tagged alex ross, beethoven, ben heppner, brattle theatre, claire denis, drama, fidelio, florestan, french films, harvard film archive, heldentenors, james levine, karita mattila, leftism, leonore, peter watkins, richard margison, the left, theatre, zizek
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Carmen was the first opera I knew and loved, before its tunes became too familiar and the eager young self dismissed it as unsophisticated. Last night, in the Zeffirelli production first staged at the Met in 1996, I began to rediscover its musical as well as dramatic intelligence. My memory of Don Jose, formed upon […]
Also filed in Film, Labor, Love, Music, New York
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Tagged bizet, carmen, cigarettes, don jose, french, ildar abdrazakov, independence, irina mishura, Love, metropolitan opera, monogamy
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