Rule Britannia (or Lucifer auf naXos)
Michael Barclay
In art, aristocracy."
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
On 26 September 2000, the so-called Great Mike Richter performed a
'plug in', heroically, on behalf of Klaus Heiman [sic], the so-called
Authority behind ---naXos---:
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
"Most singers understand that recording opera is extremely expensive,
especially under our perfect studio (not live) conditions and are
happy with our modest flat fees. Look at our Fidelio cast! The bit
about being allowed only two or three takes and no chance of fancy
editing is nonsense ... artists are allowed as many takes as necessary
to get the music right. However, having said that, we expect our
artists to be well prepared unlike many big-name artists who rely on
the producer and editor to produce a good performance."
We ask:
1. Mr. Heiman seems to have contradicted himself by simultaneously
affirming that his artists are indeed allowed "fancy editing...to get
the music right" and ranting against the "many big-name artists who
rely on the producer and editor to produce a good performance." What
exactly is the difference? Isn't fancy editing what earns producers
and editors their bacon, be it at naXos or Lucifer Classics? Or is Mr.
Heiman whining because Lucifer's console is bigger than his?
2. Mr. Heiman seems to have fallen prey to the epidemic virus of
unfounded critical prejudice and the politics of defamation and
character-assassination (the rate of infection appears to be
abnormally high within the familial fraternity of
American/Anglosaxon/Anglophile critical bedfellows). His words can be
easily formulized: "Big Name + Big Label = Little Music (or Falsity)".
No need to state the converse: "Little/No Name + Little Label = Big
Music (or Truth)". Who exactly are these many unprepared big names?
And how, where, and when?
3. A few years back, the authority was also quoted in "The Boston
Globe" - this other 'plug in' courtesy of critic-turned-promoter
Richard "local church mice are world-class people too" Dyer. Lately,
Dyer has been heard advocating for the equal part Charity/Chimpanzee
Acts that are The Three Mo' Tenors, Andrea Bocelli, and Charlotte
Church.
["Maestros of the Pen: A History of Classical Music Criticism in
America", by Mark N. Grant, Northeastern University Press, 1998, ISBN
1-55553-363-9: n-o-t o-n-e f-o-o-t-n-o-t-e on Dyer --- and this
after a 25-year+ career behind him dedicated to latter-day
Anglo+Judeo+Homo-centric bitchery and dishonesty; and as long
dedicated to sobbing after one Lucine Amara.]
But back to the authority:
"The market is shifting away from name artists, and the average music
lover is confused by bins crowded by recordings. What is the
difference between Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado and Riccardo Chailly
in a given piece? Whatever the difference is, it doesn't mean anything
to the average music lover who gives up and chooses our recording
because it is more reasonably priced, and the performance is just as
good. It is an absurdity for Plácido Domingo to sing 'The Barber of
Seville'; our recording is a better performance of the opera. If
Cheryl Studer were to come to me and ask to sing some of the operas
she has recorded, I wouldn't let her." {Author: Richard Dyer / Date:
19.01.1994 / Page: 61 / Section: Living Arts}
We comment and ask:
3A. Funny but we bet that the suits at Lucifer Classics swear
t-h-e-i-r barber gives a better haircut. Not that some of us (not
nearly enough) give a damn about Sire Domingo, at least not since his
early 90s (and thereafter) publicity and musical circus prostitutions.
3B. Let us cut to the chase: the real reason for the present-day
crisis is that the live and documented legacies of certain important
big-names (those immediately preceding the generation of today's
so-called "A List") literally fell through a g-e-n-e-r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l
c-r-a-c-k. In the realm of opera this previous generation came "too
soon" after the Marias and the Renatas and the Joans and the
Montserrats and the Vickys and the Mirellas and the Regines and
whoever....but "too late" for today's democratic free-for-all (think
of the deregulation of the airline industry in the U.S.A. - surely it
is cheaper to fly and with more options but the experience is ghastly)
a-n-d the quick fixes and seductions of Hyper Public Relations and
Cyberspace. Few artists can survive without some form of critical and
popular encouragement. It became fashionable sport (nah, olympics) for
too influential but equally ignorant, tin-eared and corrosively
partial critics and their bedfellows to dismiss these artists' work
faster than they could say Compact Disc (and worse: to fully ignore
too - consider the phenomenon that is the Phenomenally Perverse
Eclipsing by the press of a certain v-e-t-e-r-a-n soprano whose
stage appearances are pre-judged to be just that: appearances: phantom
ships in the night, when noticed ---- or to fully deny the usual
"critical analysis" - is it?- accorded lesser lights ("Monsieur G
could not sustain pitch b-u-t the Sicilian
understanding" [the same understanding which, according to the
experts, eludes fellow Southerner Riccardo Muti] - "Madame F [no other
soprano before or during Renée is known to have ever "taken
chances"....hear hear] shrieked unnaturally, flatting two high A
naturals and her overall intonation was insecure too b-u-t the
gowns" - "Hausfrau V was in customary squally voice again last night
and her top sounded tired, though no fault of her own, b-u-t her
sofa scene was comfortably moving" - "Irish-American AFL-CIO Heroine F
[who, by the by, tries, and is carded, to "sing" "everything"] [no
other soprano before or during Lauren is known to have ever "taken
chances"....hear hear] could not sing Reiza's music [she replaced
DeVoid, who had also cancelled all engagements in Vienna, and for the
2nd season in a row] b-u-t the visceral collision") - you know the
skit - why yes, ladies and gents, even these acts of levitation are
denied Midland, Michigan's Prodigal Daughter --- But then, taking into
account the desperate [in vain] efforts toward reconstruction, toward
opening new markets (undue
over-exposure in Arts journalism - over who counts - over what counts
- being the final vestige of their former Imperial selves), what is
the increasingly brilliant, independent-minded, impartial, cultured,
mature, and sympathetic
---right?--- Anglocentric Universe to do with a creature who refuses
categorization? - of what value or use is the lady? - of what value or
use is the artist? - who is neither English (nor pretender) n-o-r
r-e-s-i-d-e-n-t n-o-r c-i-t-i-z-e-n n-o-r D-a-m-e nor Faerie
Queene nor Greek (nor pretender) nor black-and-blue (nor pretender)
nor German (nor pretender) nor Austrian (nor pretender) nor
Kammersängerin nor French (nor pretender) nor
Cinema Paradiso Italian (nor pretender) nor Eastern European (nor
pretender) nor Spaniard/Latin American bombshell (they are the flavor
of the moment) nor Argentinian Tango nor East Coast Yiddishbbuk nor
Anonymous 4 nor Asian nor Canadian nor Aussie --- nor, most
importantly, deemed
sufficiently A-m-e-r-i-c-a-n --- n-o-r r-e-s-i-d-e-n-t nor
MET-centric nor
Manhattan/Queens/Brooklyn-ette nor Broadway belcher nor Saint
Francis-can nor Angelena nor Chicagoan nor Texan nor New Mexican nor
Washingtonian nor Saint Louis Gal nor panderer nor tall nor thin nor
heroine-overdose chic nor blonde nor Blonde Ambition nor grotesque nor
grotesquely zaftig nor power hungry
nor faghag nor lesbian nor cherub nor hairy chested nor fashion rag
nor glamour puss nor aspirant nor aspirate nor potential nor promise
(what you hear is what you get) nor apology nor preserved museum mummy
nor soccer mum nor sucker nor trend nor hip nor H.I.P. nor castrata
nor contralto nor countertenor nor counterculture nor lyric mezzo nor
soprano on the verge of a mezzo breakdown nor vice versa nor chanteuse
nor soubrette nor starlet nor coquette nor canary nor woodbird nor
nightingale nor tic toc tic toc tic toc nor geriatric nor vanity
record label owner nor
transposer-conductor-intendant-voicecompetitor-moviemogul-realestatemagnate-restaurateur-sexsymbol-jetsetter
(all in one and one for all and all in a night) nor lazy nor shrinking
violet nor daddy's lil' lass nor mystic nor minimalist nor hyperbole
nor Überfeminist nor Konzept nor dreams and fables nor metaphysics nor
philosopher ("Philosophier' Er nicht, Herr Schatz...") nor scholar
(nor pretender) nor didact nor pedant nor peasant nor composer (you
know, like Callas, who wrote all them masterpieces now falsely
ascribed to one Bellini and one other Donizetti) nor paladin of the
glorious avant-garde nor rarity rat nor rat tat tat nor archaeologist
nor room temperature nor Sponsored By Talbots nor Anglican Service nor
Vivaldi postcard nor Handel MBA nor Britten MD nor Janácek Nobel Prize
nor cliché nor stunt nor parody nor caricature nor Disney nor Ozzie
& Harriett nor Will & Grace nor smiley face nor horseface nor humor
monger (in any event, not the shtick you grew up with) nor camp nor
marketing-promo tramp nor trademark nor image-chaser nor
sensation-seeker nor
Eurogarbage nor ez-listenin' nor pleasure ride nor automatic cruise
control nor sentiment-al nor cripple nor victim nor tearjerker nor
nostalgia trip nor tourist trap nor good-cause nor fund-raiser (so to
speak) nor social worker nor Katie Couric nor Walk For A Cure nor We
Are The World nor Sound Of Music nor Under nor Over The Rainbow nor
Rainbow
Coalition nor Summertime nor Supper Time (nice tunes....if you can)
nor fruit salad nor cotton candy nor peaches in double cream nor café
au lait nor dark chocolate nor civil/human rights centerfold nor gulag
survivor nor married to one nor refugee nor married to one nor UN
Ambassador nor member of any one precious special interest group (you
know who you are) n-o-r m-a-r-r-i-e-d t-o o-n-e n-o-r
s-t-r-a-t-e-g-i-c-a-l-l-y w-e-d-d-e-d nor politician nor
inter-national political crisis parasite nor ad-minister of propaganda
nor grassroots peace activist (you do know, don't you, that them
ancient favourite warhorses of yours composed by Beethoven and Brahms
and Wagner and Liszt were inspired by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
--- ask Mehta and Señor Honorario und Tolerant Barenboim --- by the
by, in a recent Chicago program of Lieder by Hugo Wolf, the "Great
Jewish Musician"
[and we thought it un-Klezmer to allude to this musician's other
career] in harmony with his German/Christian sub-ordinates - a
physically handicapped baritone and an underpitch soprano - were heard
"r-e-c-l-a-i-m-i-n-g the true meaning of the 'heilge Deutsches
Kunst'" --- see "Kubiak, David" --- please note that no one else
before GJM and for eons had accomplished nearly as much, and in a mere
evening) nor Adler Fella nor Crayola Opera Program alumna nor
Cardiff-Domingo-RichieTucker-BelleSilverman-Albanese-Horne-Scotto-vonStade-Heggie
groupie nor traveler along the Anglo Silk Road --- the
LandOfOz-BerlinStaatsoperUDL-LaMonnaie-ENO-Glyndebourne-NYCO-Glimmerglass-StLouis-SantaFe-SanDiego-DallasO-HoustonGO-FloridaGO-n-such
workshop ghettoes.
[Imagine, if you dare.]
E-N-V-Y = D-E-S-T-R-U-C-T-I-O-N
S-I-L-E-N-C-E = D-E-A-T-H
E-N-V-Y = D-E-S-T-R-U-C-T-I-O-N
S-I-L-E-N-C-E = D-E-A-T-H
E-N-V-Y = D-E-S-T-R-U-C-T-I-O-N
S-I-L-E-N-C-E = D-E-A-T-H
Enter into the equation the contemptibly stupid (discerning,
discerning) audiences who (wanted to and still do) believe everything
they read...and voilà, the science gives the (false)
i-m-p-r-e-s-s-i-o-n of yielding the expected (forced) hubris. Then add
the ones who stayed away from attending these artists' performances
because they were simply told to do so (in so many words). Never mind
the c-o-w-a-r-d-s who n-e-v-e-r attended but who later saw fit to
publish obituaries passing for legitimate eyewitness reports (see
"Maestros of the Pen: A History of Classical Music Criticism in
America", 1998, by Mark N. Grant, and look up "Dyer, Richard"). Never
mind the h-y-p-o-c-r-i-t-e-s who, in addition to prematurely and
irresponsibly issuing death certificates (see "Davis, Peter G."),
years later were caught with their pants down performing auto-erotica
to the tune of "Returns Triumphantly!" (see "Davis, Peter G."). Little
wonder many ceased listening --- and begin listening with others' ears
they did. But leave it to the bloodless (and if you don't have blood
you don't need a heart and if you don't have blood you will find
yourself thirsty, very thirsty, guaranteed) - it is in fact their
exclusive province - to accomplish such feats.
No, they were not Maria or Renata or Joan or Leonie or Gwyneth and why
should they? --- Take the particularly complex case of a fascinatingly
complex yet elemental, yet thoroughly modern, and yet not, artist (and
most private woman), Cheryl Studer --- was/is the backlash really for
l-a-c-k o-f q-u-a-l-i-t-y or l-a-c-k o-f a-r-t-i-s-t-i-c
w-o-r-t-h? A decade later there's a perceptible sense of panic and
fatigue among critics, industry folk, and fans alike, most shockingly
noticeable within the gated communities of the old and the jaded, who
can be heard loudly cheerleading anyone (and we mean anyone)....
[....as long as their names are n-o-t Cheryl Studer.]
[God Willing.]
[Young Ones - Do not be duped by the hollow enthusiasms of the age ---
ever seen a sad clown?]
[But now, oh today....Music and Art....or rather, what passes for
it....and every new product or stage appearance tossed our way by the
Star System we hate to love (certainly a system long preceding but
fatally ran to the ground by the prissiness of political correctness
and the Gestapo tactics of the instinct/thought-control police, in
concert with the 'World Music Congress' - the Rudases, the Mehtas, the
Levines,
the Maazels, The Three or Four or Five or Six or Seven Whores - we are
losing count -, Best Friends & Co. Inc. Ltd. - the Ozawas and the
Gergievs too
are major shareholders in this 'Juderei') - i.e., by the Star System
of
Bocelli, of course, or Hampson (now a mostly undisputed by-the-book
Straussian, Wagnerian a-n-d ...hear hear...Verdian...of Stature,
don't you know) or the Alagnas (a f-a-k-e recording of Verdi's
-Trovatore-for Sire Tony/EMI --- Grecian Approximation No. XXV - we
have lost count - has not sung Leonora where it counts, on the stage)
or the other Bocelli comrade, Fleming....well, all of it h-a-s
sudden Meaning and Necessity, so the public relationists tell
us....the Magic courtesy, n-o-t of especially great voices or
exceptional interpretive forces or personalities or even of remotely
acceptable n-e-w music, but of, *in good portion and out of
proportion*, the promo op-catchpenny that has become 9.11 --- a
monstrous crime monstrously debased by the Infernal
Spinning Wheel of commerce and avarice and revenge and murder (widely
disguised as justice) --- a tragedy now symbiotically hijacked to
peddle everything from Arms Races to Far Right-ism (right Sharon? ---
how come we don't hear strings of consistently shrill High Cs crying
for h-i-s removal? --- this time, however, we applaud Barenboim for
being practically the only one publicly playing fiddle
on the roof of the problem) to Nationalism to Requiems to
Anglo-Zionist Terrorism --- the latter conducted both musically and
extra-curricularly, most prominently with (critical mass-destruction)
heavy-metal made in the squeaky clean U.S. of A. and paid for with
y-o-u-r humble American tax dollar (as if you had a choice) and the
blood of y-o-u-r sons and daughters. --- So why won't Israel and its
Business/Washington lobbyists fight their next door neighbors, which
includes Iraq, all by themselves and with t-h-e-i-r o-w-n currency
and leave and us all a-l-o-n-e a-n-d i-n p-e-a-c-e?]
[Consequently, would that t-h-e o-t-h-e-r terrorists went home
too.]
[Discuss, if you dare.]
[And yet more Enchantment courtesy of the Panacea/Schadenfreude of
Cheryl Studer-free zones/ground zeroes.]
[About the new EMI ---Idomeneo---, we are beginning to read puff like
"a recording that n-e-e-d-e-d to be made." --- after all, it
contains the antipodean missionary of all things English, Sire
Charles; British Will o' Wisp Bostridge; Bocelli collaborator
Frittoli; and, to top it all, the New (Age) Callas - the
organically-grown, anon, pastel, and drab as
damp cardboard LetItRain Hunt(hyphen)Lieberson. But do not for a
second believe the ad-men....for this product is yet more of the
ho-hum variety.]
[About the new DECCA ---Fellatio Blues---, we are already reading
fluff like "A New F-i-r-s-t L-a-d-y of Bel Canto - Renée Fleming
very nearly manages to shake the insistent ghost of Maria Callas."
(see "www.andante.com") --- But we (not enough of us) are neither deaf
nor naïve nor stupid. You see, n-e-v-e-r e-v-e-r f-o-r-g-e-t that
sopranos like Cheryl and Maria (and countless others long before and
long after), bruised voice and heart or not, n-e-v-e-r e-v-e-r
s-t-o-o-p-e-d this low (below the navel) in the style department.
But, after all, the new product (scooped up 3 years ago) is being sold
under a neon sign that reads "Bel Canto", complete with a $2 rebate
incentive
b-e-l-o-w its reduced repo artistic sale value. You know, in the
manner of the
stereo-typical toupéed and polyester-clad used-car salesman -
insincere, cajoling, slimy, slippery, sleazy -- and that's the singing
-- a raw deal.]
Blitzkrieg-style Public Relations, Marketing, and now
Blue-Collar/Working-Class Cheap Labor (and the aesthetics, or lack of,
of - see "Flanigan, Lauren" - see "Slavs") have been summoned to the
cause of salvaging something or other from the debris of these
self-appointed "opera/music lovers'" own making. And so the armies of
businessmen have landed triumphantly with portfolios chock-full with
the truly untriumphant, the amateurs, the pedigree-less, the
unaccomplished, the homogeneous, the vocally faceless, the emaciated,
the pretty, the photogenic, the grotesque too, the church rodents, the
H.I.P.-voiced, the H.I.P.-mannered, the pedigree-less, the correct,
the obedient, the mega amplified, the firefighters, the policemen, the
construction workers, the factory slaves, the custodians, the
industrial quality, the white trash, the divas next door; the divas
next door with the cute children as gimmicks; the divas next door who
are so nice and behave so well and must reassure us about it; the
divas next door who seek psychotherapy and then have the distaste to
announce it; the divas next door who relax to the Dixie Chicks; the
vedettes next door who love all that jazz and then scat and squat
through e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g that is European a-n-d Classical (and
not)---
but then, in music that requires precisely that, the phlegm gets in
the way of that thang called swing; the divas next door who thrive on
wrestling, meatloaf, and fish n' chips---and show it; the divas next
door who marry well, transgenderly; the divas next door who, although
already in their 40s or beyond, appease us by "taking baby steps to
protect their voices" and who swear that that's why they will still be
in their prime in extreme old age; the divas next door who swear we
will want to hear them then; the optically challenged, the physically
handicapped, the sob stories, more sob stories, the pedigree-less, the
pedigree-less, the pedigree-less, and yet more of that. And some more
sob stories. And not to be missed: the Teddy Bears (think of - well
not really, since you can't - the cancellations, the vocal troubles,
the gross embarrassments of stunt-ed live programs - everything from
Beg Your Indulgences to Public Regrets to Tosti to Walkouts - by, for
instance, Juan Dieguito Flórez, Domingo, Terfel and Heppner - no
matter - the insulted audiences correspond to their cheating with
tears and Standing Os --- but no surprise here, for it is nothing but
another perversion of our desensitized, demoralized, diseased,
frivolous, diluted, and vulgar days --- f-u-c-k, even Joseito Carreras
became the object of one of these demonstrations - and this in the
enlightened and improved and newly innocent and important again (so it
goes) Salzburg of the summer of two-thousand-and-two-after-christ).
And thus today's so-called "A-List" (really, nothing but a paid
announcement transmitted by the "Ass-ociated Press"), the P®ops, the
Pops, the Popp Clones, the Grümmer Clones, the Callas Clones, the
Tebaldi Clones, the Steber Clones, the Schwarzkopf Clones, the Price
Clones, the Cut n' Paste Composites, the Fischer-Dieskau Clones ---
poor, pitiful facsimiles a-l-l ---, the Little Names, the Wannabes,
the Crossover Hustlers, the Bubblegum, the New Age Mongrels, the
Postmoderns, the Postmortems, the Multiculturalists, the Community
Outreachers, the Soundbites, the Marketing Love Couples/Traumpaars,
the Divine, the Fabulous, the Delicious, and the Little Labels That
Could all have it relatively easy in comparison to that preceding
generation. And the critical standards --- what standards? - whose?
--- have reformed, or rather, have doubled and tripled and....But
injury
is often prone to insult. Hell, standards have liquidized and then
evaporated vis a vis the new generation. It is no longer Sound Music
Criticism or Analysis but lowest-common-denominator Public Relations
Spin [and worse: the fixation with that elusive something known as
---technique--- technique and organization and
perfection as ends in themselves: music-making as athletic match:
missing the forest for the trees --- but this is another angle for
another day]. So much so that it has become strangely and suddenly
k-o-s-h-e-r once more (Jesus!, how many more times are we going to
hear about over-saturation?) to make records (remember when you and I
were advised to swiftly r-e-j-e-c-t, wholesale, them records [or
anything, for that matter] by or with Cheryl Studer becuz they were
everything from digital to illusion to un-necessary to in-competent to
im-personal to contrived to in-experienced to un-felt to
perfect to dull to null to this to that to that to this - beautiful
even? --- you know, the toxic byproduct of uncontained Kapitalismus -
the same Kapitalismus that gave us such goodies as Meyerbeer,
penicillin, opera glasses, the megaphone, the horn, the microphone,
the photograph, the ("fideistic") Mapleson cylinders, the phonograph,
the light bulb, animated pictures, the telegraph, the typewriter,
carbon paper, the telephone, the clock, the metronome, the radio, the
television, faster trains, the automobile, the jet plane, robots,
rockets, missiles, bombs, Star Wars, frying bacon, monaural sound,
analog tech, reel-to-reels, 8-tracks, the cassette, the LP, stereo
sound, surround sound, faxes, overnight mail, the (unfortunate and
devastating to the testimonials of a vast majority of contemporary
artists) digital tech, the PC, laptops, lapdogs, the CD, the walkman,
the minidisc, the CD-ROM, the famous
(pitch-re-engineered) Richter CD-ROMs, the (disgracefully influential,
sound-engineering-bag-of-tricks-wise) Solti Ring, naXos, andante.com,
12,000 other music websites, the pirates, special effects, the VHS,
HTML, the WWW, Apples, TV dinners, Windows, the cell phone, the
LD, the DVD, MP3s, Opera In The Origiinal (that's English to you,
perennially and naturally), CNN operas, Vilar titles, Vilar
entitlements, multitasking, micromanaging, acoustically enhanced opera
houses and concert halls, euphemisms, virtual reality, cloning,
artificial intelligence, Callas martyrs, Caruso, Ponselle, Callas,
more Callas, Flagstad, Nilsson, more EMI
Callas re-re-re-re-re-releases, yet more Sony Glenn Gould
re-re-re-re-re-compilations, etc. - and of course, the same
Kapitalismus that has transmitted the Oh So Long Anticipated, Oh So
Extensive, Oh So Very Important --- and, at last!, Oh So Necessary ---
recorded statements from, for example and randomly, Renée, Aprile
[these days reduced - or is it enhanced? - to croon opposite Danny Boy
The 9.11 NYPD Singin' Cop, pathetically], Alessandra, "Marilyn Monroe
Purr" Debbie (see "Ross, Alex") - (a f-a-k-e recording of R.
Strauss' -Friedenstag- for Sinopoli/DGG --- "...Deborah Voigt's Maria
[which was in fact dubbed in after the recording was completed, after
the
original soprano had dropped out]...." -'Fanfare', Sep/Oct 2002, p.
214), Cathy, Kathy, Jane, Ruthie Ann, "Veteran Wagnerian" Karita (see
"Tommasini, Anthony") - (a f-a-k-e recording of Schoenberg's
-Gurrelieder- for Sire Simon/EMI -
http://andante.com/magazine/article.cfm?id=17979), Violeta, Waltraud -
and much much more) ----- for naXos, Rare Opera,
Mom & Pop, even for Lucifer Classics. No matter.
[But......we are afraid it's t-o-o l-a-t-e --- because the
registers, they ain't ringin' (and all too often, we regret to
announce, not just the cash ones).]
3C. How exactly is naXos alleviating the crisis of overcrowding and
confusion among consumers? In opera titles alone they have recorded
a-n-e-w: Boheme, Fidelio, Butterfly, Tosca, Flying Dutchman, Barber of
Seville, Aida, Rigoletto, Magic Flute, and on and on and on. Correct
us if we are wrong but these bread and butter works were not lacking
in existing documentation, whether historical or not, hysterical or
not, distinguished or not, high end or not. And the combined sad
efforts from naXos simply do not measure up. Why pay less, then, when
you can get better and more for twice the price?
3D. "Oh but it does mean something, it does", we say. So the "average
music lover" has become the barometer of quality and relevance? Indeed
they don't deserve Muti, Abbado, or Chailly (however much they deserve
the three-minute-aria-cum-top-ten-hit). And is the Hulun Hu Tympany
Orchestra really better than Amsterdam, Dresden, Berlin or Vienna?
(although, truth be told, too many of us have heard the Vienna, for
one, play and sound like a colony of monkeys under the stick shift of
a colonized but loyal to the crown, and thus celebrated, Indian
cabbie).
3E. And Cheryl Studer, she's not one of the unwashed, is she? Were
they her contemporaries, would Mr. Heiman have singled out Callas,
Tebaldi, Sutherland, or Caballe, to name but a few, in this manner?
After all, they were/are *Daughters Of Lucifer*, to our benefit.
Presumably naXos treats its "illustrious" roster with more dignity,
respect, and vocal support. Speaking of vocal support, perhaps the
crafty (and reptilian) Mr. Heiman is unaware that *his own* Floria
Tosca (Madame Nelly Miri-a-e-i-o-u --- "más sabe el burro que tú")
reportedly bombed in the same role in Orange, France in the year 2000
a-n-d as Norma at the ROH, London, also in 2000. However, the Tosca
and Norma catastrophes strangely failed to make a dent in the armory
of the "cognoscenti" and their media spokespeople. And it is not so
widely known that Madame M has encountered more stage catastrophes
since then. For those not "in the know", Madame M is said to be the
Bastard Child of the Incestuous Union of the Twins Callas and Heiman,
now all grown and matured into a very 'Rare Opera' singer complete
with numerous fancifully edited recordings to her name. No matter.
4. Many of us have heard naXos' Caruso edition (not that the
long-deceased tenor is remotely a Heiman discovery/original). We
wonder what Mr. Heiman's authoritative producers and editors (and his
Public Relationists) would have made of the great man today for
violating at least a couple of standards of sound conduct:
throat-clearing smack in the middle of a take and a glaring false
entry at the beginning of another? And what of the poor pianist?
Good God.
----------------------------
Considering the imminent collapse of new opera recordings on Compact
Disc from the Universal Classics family of labels (DGG, DECCA,
Philips)....and now apparently EMI Classics too....let us take a close
look at the following inventory ---
* Title role in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, rec 8/90, London SO,
Marin, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Hanna Glawari in Lehar's Lustige Witwe, rec 1/94, Vienna PO,
Gardiner, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Countess in Mozart's Nozze di Figaro, rec 1-2/94, Vienna PO, Abbado,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Countess in Mozart's Nozze di Figaro, rec 5/91, Vienna PO, Abbado,
Sony VHS
* Title role in Rossini's Semiramide, rec 7/92, London SO, Marin,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Florinda in Schubert's Fierrabras, rec 5/88, Chamber Orch of Europe,
Abbado, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Title role in R. Strauss' Salome, rec 12/90, Deutsche Oper Berlin,
Sinopoli, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto, rec 6/93, Metropolitan Opera, Levine,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto Act III, rec 9/91, Metropolitan Opera,
Levine, Lucifer Classics/DGG VHS
* Desdemona in Verdi's Otello, rec 5/93, Opéra Bastille, Chung,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Violetta in Verdi's Traviata, rec 1/91, Metropolitan Opera, Levine,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Elisabeth in Wagner's Tannhäuser, rec '88, Philharmonia, Sinopoli,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Elisabeth in Wagner's Tannhäuser, rec '89, Bayreuth, Sinopoli,
Lucifer Classics/Philips VHS
* Senta in Wagner's fliegende Holländer, rec 1/91, Deutsche Oper
Berlin, Sinopoli, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Gutrune in Wagner's Götterdämmerung, rec 5/89, Metropolitan Opera,
Levine, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Title role in Floyd's Susannah, rec 3/94, Opéra de Lyon, Nagano,
Virgin
* Marguerite in Gounod's Faust, rec 2/91, Toulouse, Plasson, Our Own
EMI
* Salomé in Massenet's Hérodiade, rec 11-12/94, Toulouse, Plasson, Our
Own EMI
* Donna Anna in Mozart's Don Giovanni, rec 9/90, Vienna PO, Muti, Our
Own EMI
* Konstanze in Mozart's Entführung aus dem Serail, rec 4/91, Vienna
Symphony, Weil, Sony
* Queen of the Night in Mozart's Zauberflöte, rec 7/89, ASMF,
Marriner, Lucifer Classics/Philips
* Giulietta in Offenbach's Contes d'Hoffmann, rec 87/88/89, Dresden
Staatskapelle, Tate, Lucifer Classics/Philips
* Matilde in Rossini's Guglielmo Tell, rec 12/88, La Scala, Muti,
Lucifer Classics/Philips (also on Home Vision VHS & DVD)
* Madama Cortese in Rossini's Viaggio a Reims, rec 10/92, Berlin PO,
Abbado, Sony
* Title role in Spohr's Jessonda, rec '84, ORF Orchestra, Albrecht,
Voce LP
* Chrysothemis in R. Strauss' Elektra, rec 1/90, Bavarian RSO,
Sawallisch, Our Own EMI
* Chrysothemis in R. Strauss' Elektra, rec 6/89, Vienna PO, Abbado,
Virgin VHS & Arthaus DVD
* Empress in R. Strauss' Frau ohne Schatten, rec 2-12/87, Bavarian
RSO, Sawallisch, Our Own EMI
* Empress in R. Strauss' Frau ohne Schatten, rec '92, Vienna PO,
Solti, Lucifer Classics/Decca-London VHS & DVD
* Title role in Verdi's Aida, rec 6/94, Covent Garden, Downes,
Serenissima CD, Pioneer & Kultur Videos (VHS & DVD)
* Odabella in Verdi's Attila, rec 6-7/89, La Scala, Muti, Our Own EMI
* Odabella in Verdi's Attila, rec 6/90, La Scala, Muti, Home Vision
VHS & DVD
* Elena in Verdi's Vespri Siciliani, rec 12/89-1/90, La Scala, Muti,
Our Own EMI (also on Home Vision VHS & DVD)
* Drolla in Wagner's Die Feen, rec 7/83, Bavarian RSO, Sawallisch,
Orfeo
* Elsa in Wagner's Lohengrin (from Bayreuth), rec 6/90, Bayreuth,
Schneider, Lucifer Classics/Philips (also on VHS)
* Elsa in Wagner's Lohengrin (from Vienna), rec '90, Vienna PO,
Abbado, Home Vision VHS & DVD
* Eva in Wagner's Meistersinger, rec 4/93, Bavarian State Opera,
Sawallisch, Our Own EMI
* Irene in Wagner's Rienzi, rec 7/83, Bavarian State Opera,
Sawallisch, Orfeo
* Ortlinde in Wagner's Walküre, rec 8/81, Dresden Staatskapelle,
Janowski, RCA/Eurodisc
* Sieglinde in Wagner's Walküre, rec 2-3/88, Bavarian RSO, Haitink,
Our Own EMI
* Zemlinsky's Der Geburtstagder Infantin, rec 83, Berlin RSO,
Albrecht, Koch-Schwann
* Coloratura Arias by Bellini (Sonnambula/Norma), Verdi
(Traviata/Trovatore), Donizetti (Lucia/Lucrezia Borgia), Rossini
(Barbiere/Semiramide), rec 4/89, Munich RSO, Ferro, Our Own EMI
* Mozart Arias
(Entführung/Zauberflöte/Idomeneo/Nozze/Giovanni/Clemenza/Cosi), rec
9/89, ASMF, Marriner, Lucifer Classics/Philips
* R. Strauss' Vier Letzte Lieder/Wagner's Wesendonck-Lieder/Isolde's
Liebestod, rec 1/93, Dresden Staatskapelle, Sinopoli, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Isolde's Liebestod, rec 1/88, Bavarian RSO, Tate, Our Own EMI
* Wagner Gala (Tannhäuser/Lohengrin/Meistersinger/Walküre), rec 12/93,
Berlin PO, Abbado, Lucifer Classics/DGG (also on VHS)
* First Europakonzert - in Prague (Mozart: "Non mi dir"/"Ch'io mi
scordi di te-Non temer amato bene"), rec 5/91, Berlin PO, Abbado, Sony
VHS & DVD
* Covent Garden Gala (Otello/Traviata/Fledermaus), rec 7/88, Covent
Garden, Barker, Our Own EMI
* Sacred Works (Bach/Schubert/Mendelssohn/Handel/Mozart/Gounod/Faure/Poulenc/Bernstein/Bruch),
rec 3/91, London SO, Marin, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Samuel Barber Songs, rec 9/92, Browning, Emerson String Quartet,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, rec 8/91, Vienna PO, Levine, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Beethoven in Berlin (Ah! Perfido/Choral Fantasy/Egmont), rec 12/91,
Berlin PO, Abbado, Lucifer Classics/DGG (also on VHS)
* Brahms' German Requiem, rec 10/92, Berlin PO, Abbado, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Schubert Lieder, rec 1/90, Gage, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Salzburg Recital (R. Strauss/Schubert/Debussy), rec 8/92, Gage,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Mahler's Klagende Lied, rec 11/90, Philharmonia, Sinopoli, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Mahler's Symphony No. 2, rec 11/92, Vienna PO, Abbado, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Mahler's Symphony No. 8, rec 11-12/90, Philharmonia, Sinopoli,
Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Mahler's Symphony No. 8, rec 1/94, Berlin PO, Abbado, Lucifer
Classics/DGG
* Verdi's Requiem, rec 6/87, La Scala, Muti, Our Own EMI
* Verdi's Requiem, rec 11/91, Vienna PO, Abbado, Lucifer Classics/DGG
* Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, rec 4/89, Philadelphia Orchestra, Muti,
Our Own EMI
* Bruckner's Mass in F Min/Mozart's Vespers, rec 3/77, MIT Choral
Society, Oliver, MIT LPs
* Donizetti's Requiem, rec 1/84, Bamberg SO, Gómez-Martínez, Orfeo
* von Schweinitz's Messe Op. 21, rec 7/84, RSO Berlin, Albrecht, Wergo
* R. Strauss Choral Works, rec 9/84, RIAS Kammerchor, Gronostay,
Creed, Deutsche Schallplatten
"L-A Ú-L-T-I-M-A..........que ríe, ríe mejor."
Bravissima Cheryl Studer, Hija Querida. Very beautifully and
exquisitely done. A most wonderful, exemplary, and unforgettable
legacy, a legacy of e-x-c-e-p-t-i-o-n-a-l q-u-a-l-i-t-y a-n-d
d-i-s-t-i-n-c-t-i-o-n --- the work of a consummate artist. Thank you.
Thank you for Dedication, Seriousness, and Integrity. Thank you for
remaining True to your self, to the artform, and to m-u-s-i-c. Good
Music. Thank you for a Universe of Sound and Texture and Expression
a-l-l o-f y-o-u-r o-w-n. Thank you for g-e-n-e-r-o-s-i-t-y.
Thank you for H-i-g-h I-n-d-i-v-i-d-u-a-l-i-t-y.
And thank you too, Universal, EMI and Sony, for having had the
foreskin to recognize and capture genius in our midst (now that these
dinosaurs' [delusional] populist causes, causes palatable to the
Anglocentric and their Axes (oh irony!) Of Love, have caused them to
trim....ouch....their future....for that squeaky clean look and
sound....and potent-ial self-extinction).
----------------------------
And now, a little something to ponder about ---
"Things got pretty rough at the last Philharmonic concert. A bitter
battle broke out over Liszt's 'Mephisto Waltz.' It was the standees
and a part of the gallery, resolved to give their all, against the
parterre, the mountain against the marsh. On the one side we had
youth, intelligence, idealism, good judgement, enthusiasm and
conviction; on the other dullness, frivolity, debility, ignorance,
arrogance, materialism. Such were the contending forces.
There was a lot of applause, but a lot of hissing, too. Since, as we
all know, these Semitic hissing sounds traditionally served the
'chosen people' as shibboleth in combat with their neighbors, it was
not hard to determine who it was that so emphatically proclaimed both
their dissent and their identity. Indeed, these 'chosen people'
habitually make a great show of their exquisite taste. They are always
ready to recognize in Beethoven a good composer. And yet there are
those who see nothing heroic in the courage of such convictions. What,
then, can we call courageous? Let it pass. These excellent and
generous souls will surely enrich the National Guard with a doughty
legion of tailors, and thus be of service to the state. You can take
an oath on that.
To take seriously the ludicrous behavior of these worthy parterre
subscribers toward the works of a genius such as Liszt would be like
punishing children's bad manners with the rack. We are not so cruel.
But it is well to look for what it is that causes the public to behave
like an ill-mannered child and to think like a well-groomed cad. How
is it, we ask, that Liszt's compositions are rejected by the majority
of our degenerate public? The answer is made uncommonly easy for me,
since it is contained in the question. But then why, someone could
object, do Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, etc., appeal to this same
degenerate public? The objection is so banal, the answer so obvious,
that any blockhead could handle it easily. But should someone choose
to ask me what I mean by degenerate public, I accept the challenge
gladly, and am ready with the answer: a degenerate public is one that
is content to be the ward of a degenerate press.
It is a public of newspaper readers. That is the source of all other
evils. That is the source of the thoughtlessness, frivolity,
dependence, distraction, insensibility and, above all, the bias
against those works condemned to death by the press. If this were an
ingenuous public, it would not tolerate for another day the shameful
chains it now fastens to itself voluntarily. But the habit of
cud-chewing has already become too delightful to permit the slightest
effort to use one's own teeth. Thus, this public receives its
impression of a work of art not directly, but from the review in the
newspaper, to be had in concrete form for a patent. Go then to the
apothecary, and buy yourselves some nux vomica or some other purgative
if you want to have an impression. The effect remains essentially the
same, and you spare yourselves the price of the ticket. And so a
public, the despicable tool of a despicable press, will pass judgement
on the works of a genius! A sluggardly mob that enters the concert
hall as if it were a toy store, reduces the noblest possessions of
mankind to idle diversions, and then, if that is not satisfactory,
arrogantly turns its back on the work of art and ceremoniously
hisses...fie, fie, and once again fie!!!
Given such circumstances, it is hardly surprising that Liszt's
original compositions have excited a lively 'for' and 'against'
whenever they have been played in Vienna. This time the applause from
the standees was still far from constituting a demonstration when a
few hot headed Philistines signalled, stupidly enough, the shibboleth.
That was pouring oil on fire. The applause grew louder, and rightly
so, since it was directed no less at the splendid accomplishment of
the orchestra and its conductor, Hans Richter, than at the work
itself. And did not the wonderful performance of this Lisztian
composition merit the most extravagant praise? What did Liszt's
admirers do to excite the drowsy parterre to a counter-demonstration?
They were simply giving due honor to service rendered."
Hugo Wolf
Vienna, 25 April 1886
----------------------------
A HARPSICHORD GLISTENS AND TRIUMPHS
You and I, we know the climate is profoundly d-e-g-e-n-e-r-a-t-e
when a nobody of a harpsichordist and her twinklin' little instrument
command more respect and accolades and analysis from 'the chosen
people' (The Rake's Progress --
http://www.operajaponica.org/reviews/dvd/rake96dvd.htm) than those
ass-igned a certain veteran soprano. Consider this shibboleth ---
http://www.operajaponica.org/reviews/dvd/aidaroh94dvd.htm
Verdi: AIDA
Reviewed by Michael Richter, 27 May 2002
Cast: Cheryl Studer (Aida), Luciana d'Intino (Amneris), Dennis O'Neill
(Radames), Alexandru Agache (Amonasro), Robert Lloyd (Ramfis), Mark
Beesley (Il Re), John Marsden (Messenger), Yvonne Barclay
(Sacerdotta), Chorus & Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent
Garden, Sir Edward Downes (conductor). Elijah Moshinsky (director)
Thus spoke our hero:
{{One can now prove that it is possible to make a performance of Aida
dull. Singing and conducting are altogether competent, but the only
elements of this release which enliven the work are those of the
production - and they are more often confusing or distracting than
constructive. Lloyd infuses some life into his character, but Beesley
is both vocally and dramatically subpar. D'Intino has some moments of
expression but they are not those most needed; the opening scene of
Act IV, for example, is flaccid. Studer, O'Neill and Agache sing all
the notes and none of the music. Many points in the score are marked
'a piacere', but the pleasure of the artists appears to be to do
nothing at all. The effect is altogether colorless - a grey and
pointless recitation of one of the most vibrant scores in opera.}}
"Things got pretty rough at the last Philharmonic concert. A bitter
battle broke out over Liszt's 'Mephisto Waltz.' It was the standees
and a part of the gallery, resolved to give their all, against the
parterre, the mountain against the marsh. On the one side we had
youth, intelligence, idealism, good judgement, enthusiasm and
conviction; on the other dullness, frivolity, debility, ignorance,
arrogance, materialism. Such were the contending forces.
There was a lot of applause, but a lot of hissing, too. Since, as we
all know, these Semitic hissing sounds traditionally served the
'chosen people' as shibboleth in combat with their neighbors, it was
not hard to determine who it was that so emphatically proclaimed both
their dissent and their identity. Indeed, these 'chosen people'
habitually make a great show of their exquisite taste. They are always
ready to recognize in Beethoven a good composer. And yet there are
those who see nothing heroic in the courage of such convictions. What,
then, can we call courageous? Let it pass. These excellent and
generous souls will surely enrich the National Guard with a doughty
legion of tailors, and thus be of service to the state. You can take
an oath on that.
To take seriously the ludicrous behavior of these worthy parterre
subscribers toward the works of a genius such as Liszt would be like
punishing children's bad manners with the rack. We are not so cruel.
But it is well to look for what it is that causes the public to behave
like an ill-mannered child and to think like a well-groomed cad. How
is it, we ask, that Liszt's compositions are rejected by the majority
of our degenerate public? The answer is made uncommonly easy for me,
since it is contained in the question. But then why, someone could
object, do Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, etc., appeal to this same
degenerate public? The objection is so banal, the answer so obvious,
that any blockhead could handle it easily. But should someone choose
to ask me what I mean by degenerate public, I accept the challenge
gladly, and am ready with the answer: a degenerate public is one that
is content to be the ward of a degenerate press.
It is a public of newspaper readers. That is the source of all other
evils. That is the source of the thoughtlessness, frivolity,
dependence, distraction, insensibility and, above all, the bias
against those works condemned to death by the press. If this were an
ingenuous public, it would not tolerate for another day the shameful
chains it now fastens to itself voluntarily. But the habit of
cud-chewing has already become too delightful to permit the slightest
effort to use one's own teeth. Thus, this public receives its
impression of a work of art not directly, but from the review in the
newspaper, to be had in concrete form for a patent. Go then to the
apothecary, and buy yourselves some nux vomica or some other purgative
if you want to have an impression. The effect remains essentially the
same, and you spare yourselves the price of the ticket. And so a
public, the despicable tool of a despicable press, will pass judgement
on the works of a genius! A sluggardly mob that enters the concert
hall as if it were a toy store, reduces the noblest possessions of
mankind to idle diversions, and then, if that is not satisfactory,
arrogantly turns its back on the work of art and ceremoniously
hisses...fie, fie, and once again fie!!!
Given such circumstances, it is hardly surprising that Liszt's
original compositions have excited a lively 'for' and 'against'
whenever they have been played in Vienna. This time the applause from
the standees was still far from constituting a demonstration when a
few hot headed Philistines signalled, stupidly enough, the shibboleth.
That was pouring oil on fire. The applause grew louder, and rightly
so, since it was directed no less at the splendid accomplishment of
the orchestra and its conductor, Hans Richter, than at the work
itself. And did not the wonderful performance of this Lisztian
composition merit the most extravagant praise? What did Liszt's
admirers do to excite the drowsy parterre to a counter-demonstration?
They were simply giving due honor to service rendered."
Hugo Wolf
Vienna, 25 April 1886
----------------------------
M-U-S-I-C OF THE FUTURE
Berg, Alban / Wozzeck / Marie
Cajkovskij, Pëtr Il'ic / Evgenij Onegin / Tatjana
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus / Così fan tutte / Fiordiligi
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus / Don Giovanni / Donna Elvira
Puccini, Giacomo / Manon Lescaut / Manon Lescaut
Puccini, Giacomo / Tosca / Tosca
Strauss, Richard / Capriccio / Gräfin
Strauss, Richard / Salome / Salome
Verdi, Giuseppe / Ballo in Maschera, Un / Amelia
Verdi, Giuseppe / Don Carlo / Elisabetta
MORE M-U-S-I-C....REDIVIVUS
Beethoven, Ludwig van / Fidelio / Leonore
Lehár, Franz / Lustige Witwe, Die / Hanna Glawari
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus / Idomeneo / Elettra
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus / Nozze di Figaro, Le / Contessa d'Almaviva
Strauss, Richard / Elektra / Chrysothemis
Verdi, Giuseppe / Aida / Aida
Verdi, Giuseppe / Otello / Desdemona
Wagner, Richard / Meistersinger von Nürnberg / Eva
AND YET MORE M-U-S-I-C
Strauss, Richard / Arabella / Arabella
Strauss, Richard / Ariadne auf Naxos / Primadonna/Ariadne
Strauss, Richard / Frau ohne Schatten, Die / Kaiserin
Strauss, Richard / Rosenkavalier, Der / Marschallin
Wagner, Richard / fliegende Holländer, Der / Senta
Wagner, Richard / Lohengrin / Elsa von Brabant
Wagner, Richard / Tannhäuser / Elisabeth
Wagner, Richard / Walküre, Die / Sieglinde
----------------------------
"The dangers of life
are infinite
And safety is among them."
--- Goethe
Manuela Hoelterhoff
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
by, in a recent Chicago program of Hugo Wolf's Lieder, the "Great
Jewish Musician" [and we thought it un-Klezmer to allude to this
musician's other career] in harmony with his German/Christian
sub-ordinates - a
physically handicapped baritone and an underpitch soprano (see
"Kubiak, David")
- were heard "r-e-c-l-a-i-m-i-n-g the true meaning of the 'heilge
Deutsches
Kunst'" --- again, see "Kubiak, David" --- please note that no one
else
before GJM had accomplished nearly as much, and in a mere
evening - of course, we know now that Wolf wrote his songs inspired by
people everywhere holding hands) nor Adler Fella nor Crayola Opera
[Imagine, if you dare.]
[God Willing.]
[Discuss, if you dare.]
sopranos of the calibre of Cheryl and Maria (and countless others long
Manuela Hoelterhoff
Sergio Segalini
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
popular encouragement. It became fashionable sport (nah, Olympics -
nah, Mob Rule) for too influential but equally ignorant, tin-eared and
Sergio Segalini
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
Anglo+Judeo+Homo-centric bitchery and dishonesty; and just as long
dedicated to sobbing after one Lucine Amara.]
But back to the authority:
"The market is shifting away from name artists, and the average music
lover is confused by bins crowded by recordings. What is the
difference between Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado and Riccardo Chailly
in a given piece? Whatever the difference is, it doesn't mean anything
to the average music lover who gives up and chooses our recording
because it is more reasonably priced, and the performance is just as
good. It is an absurdity for Plácido Domingo to sing 'The Barber of
Seville'; our recording is a better performance of the opera. If
Cheryl Studer were to come to me and ask to sing some of the operas
she has recorded, I wouldn't let her." {Author: Richard Dyer / Date:
19.01.1994 / Page: 61 / Section: Living Arts}
We comment and ask:
3A. Funny but we bet that the suits at Lucifer Classics swear
t-h-e-i-r barber gives a better haircut. Not that some of us (not
nearly enough) give a damn about Sire Domingo, at least not since his
early 90s (and thereafter) publicity and musical circus prostitutions.
3B. Let us cut to the chase: the real reason for the present-day
crisis is that the relevance of live engagements and the documented
legacies of certain important big-names (those immediately preceding
the generation of today's so-called "A List") literally fell through a
g-e-n-e-r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l
c-r-a-c-k. In the realm of opera, this previous generation came "too
soon" after the Marias and the Renatas and the Joans and the
Montserrats and the Vickys and the Mirellas and the Regines and
whoever....and "too late" for today's democratic free-for-all (think
of the deregulation of the airline industry in the U.S.A. - surely it
is cheaper to fly and with more options but the experience is ghastly)
in deadly mix with the quick fixes and seductions of Hyper Public
Relations and
Cyberspace. Few artists can survive without some form of critical and
popular encouragement. It became fashionable sport (nah, Mob Rule -
nah, Olympics) for too influential but equally ignorant, tin-eared and
incredibly, corrosively partial critics and their bedfellows to
dismiss these artists' work faster than they could say Compact Disc
(and worse: to fully ignore too - consider the phenomenon that is the
Phenomenally Perverse
Eclipsing by the press of a certain v-e-t-e-r-a-n soprano whose
stage appearances are pre-judged to be just that: Appearances: Phantom
Ships In The Night, when noticed ---- or to fully d-e-n-y the usual
"critical analysis" - is that what it is? - accorded minor lights
ascribed to one Bellini, one Donizetti, and one other Verdi) nor
paladin of the
glorious avant-garde nor rarity rat nor rat tat tat nor archaeologist
nor room temperature nor Sponsored By Talbots nor Anglican Service nor
Vivaldi postcard nor Handel MBA nor Britten MD nor Janácek Nobel Prize
nor cliché nor stunt nor parody nor caricature nor Disney nor Ozzie
& Harriett nor Will & Grace nor smiley face nor horseface nor humor
monger (in any event, not the shtick you grew up with) nor camp nor
marketing-promo tramp nor trademark nor image-chaser nor
sensation-seeker nor Eurogarbage nor ez-listenin' nor pleasure ride
nor automatic cruise control nor sentiment-al nor cripple nor married
to one nor victim nor tearjerker nor nostalgia trip nor tourist trap
nor good-cause nor fund-raiser (so to speak) nor social worker nor
Katie Couric nor Walk For A Cure nor We Are The World nor Sound Of
Music nor Under nor Over The Rainbow nor
Rainbow Coalition nor Summertime nor Supper Time (nice tunes....if you
can)
nor fruit salad nor cotton candy nor peaches in double cream nor café
au lait nor dark chocolate nor civil/human rights centerfold nor gulag
survivor nor married to one nor refugee nor married to one nor UN
Ambassador nor married to one nor member of any one precious special
interest group (you know who you are) n-o-r m-a-r-r-i-e-d t-o
o-n-e n-o-r
s-t-r-a-t-e-g-i-c-a-l-l-y w-e-d-d-e-d nor politician nor married to
one nor
inter-national political crisis parasite nor ad-minister of propaganda
nor grassroots peace activist (you do know, don't you, that them
ancient favourite warhorses of yours composed by Beethoven and Brahms
and Wagner and Liszt were inspired by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
--- ask Mehta and Señor Honorario und Tolerant Barenboim --- by the
by, in a recent Chicago program of Hugo Wolf's Lieder, the "Great
Jewish Musician" [and we thought it un-Klezmer to allude to this
musician's other career] in harmony with his German/Christian
sub-ordinates - a "physically handicapped baritone" and an "underpitch
soprano" (see "Kubiak, David") - were heard "r-e-c-l-a-i-m-i-n-g the
true meaning of the 'heilge Deutsches Kunst'" --- again, see "Kubiak,
David" --- please note that no one else before GJM had accomplished
nearly as much, and in a mere
evening - of course, we know now that Wolf wrote his songs inspired by
populations everywhere holding hands - to promote future handholding)
[Imagine, if you dare.]
No, they were/are not Maria or Renata or Joan or Leonie or Gwyneth and
why
should they be? --- Take the particularly complex case of a
fascinatingly
complex, yet elemental, yet thoroughly modern, and yet not, artist
(and
most private woman), Cheryl Studer --- was/is the backlash really for
l-a-c-k o-f q-u-a-l-i-t-y or l-a-c-k o-f a-r-t-i-s-t-i-c
w-o-r-t-h? A decade or so later there's a perceptible sense of panic
and
fatigue among critics, industry folk, and fans alike, most shockingly
noticeable within the gated communities of the old and the jaded, who
can be heard loudly cheerleading anyone (and we mean anyone)....
[....as long as their names are n-o-t Cheryl Studer.]
[God Willing.]
[Young Ones - Do not be duped by the hollow enthusiasms of the age ---
ever seen a sad clown?]
[But now, oh today....Music and Art....or rather, what passes for
it....and every new product or stage appearance tossed our way by the
Star System we hate to love (certainly a system long preceding but
fatally ran to the ground by the prissiness of political correctness
and the Gestapo tactics of the instinct/thought-control police, in
concert with the 'World Music Congress' - the Rudases, the Mehtas, the
Levines, the Maazels, The Three or Four or Five or Six or Seven Whores
- we are losing count -, Best Friends & Co. Inc. Ltd. - the Ozawas and
the
Gergievs too are major shareholders in this "Juderei") - i.e., by the
Star System of Bocelli, of course, or Hampson (now a pretty much
undisputed
by-the-book Straussian, Wagnerian a-n-d ...hear hear...Verdian...of
Stature,
don't you know) or the Alagnas (a f-a-k-e recording of Verdi's
-Trovatore- for Sire Tony/EMI --- Grecian Approximation No. XXV - we
have lost count - has not sung Leonora where it counts, on the stage)
or the other Bocelli comrade, Fleming....well, all of it h-a-s
sudden Meaning and Necessity, so the public relationists tell
us....the Magic courtesy, n-o-t of especially great voices or
exceptional interpretive forces or personalities or even of remotely
acceptable n-e-w music, but of *in good portion and out of
proportion* the promo op-catchpenny that has become 9.11 --- a
monstrous crime monstrously debased by the Infernal Spinning Wheel of
commerce and avarice and revenge and murder (widely disguised as
justice) --- a tragedy now symbiotically hijacked to peddle everything
from Arms Races to Far Right-ism (see "Sharon, Ariel" --- how come we
don't hear strings of consistently shrill High Cs crying for h-i-s
removal? --- this time, however, we applaud Barenboim for being
practically the only one publicly playing fiddle
on the roof of the problem) to Nationalism to Requiems to
Anglo-Zionist Terrorism --- the latter conducted both musically and
extra-curricularly, most prominently with (critical mass-destruction)
heavy-metal made in the squeaky clean U.S. of A. and paid for with
y-o-u-r humble American tax dollar (as if you had a choice) and the
blood of y-o-u-r sons and daughters. --- So why won't Israel and its
Business/Washington lobbyists fight their next door neighbors, which
includes Iraq, all by themselves and with t-h-e-i-r o-w-n currency
and leave us all a-l-o-n-e a-n-d i-n p-e-a-c-e?]
[Consequently, would that t-h-e o-t-h-e-r terrorists went home
too.]
[Discuss, if you dare.]
[And yet more Enchantment courtesy of the Panacea/Schadenfreude of
Cheryl Studer-free zones/ground zeroes.]
[About the new EMI ---Idomeneo---, we are beginning to read puff like
"a recording that n-e-e-d-e-d to be made." --- after all, it
contains the antipodean missionary of all things English, Sire
Charles; British Will o' Wisp Bostridge; Bocelli collaborator
Frittoli; and, to top it all, the New (Age) Callas - the
organically-grown, FDA approved, anon, pastel, and drab as
damp cardboard LetItRain Hunt(hyphen)Lieberson. But do not for a
second believe the ad-men....for this product is yet more of the
ho-hum variety.]
[About the new DECCA ---Fellatio Blues---, we are already reading
fluff like "A New F-i-r-s-t L-a-d-y of Bel Canto - Renée Fleming
very nearly manages to shake the insistent ghost of Maria Callas."
(see "www.andante.com") --- But we (not enough of us) are neither deaf
nor naïve nor stupid. You see, n-e-v-e-r e-v-e-r f-o-r-g-e-t that
sopranos of the calibre of Cheryl and Maria (and countless others long
before and long after), bruised voice and heart or not, n-e-v-e-r
e-v-e-r s-t-o-o-p-e-d this low (below the navel) in the style
department.
But, after all, the new product (scooped up 3 years ago) is being sold
under a neon sign that reads "Bel Canto", complete with a $2 rebate
incentive b-e-l-o-w its reduced repo artistic sale value. You know,
in the manner of the stereo-typical toupéed and polyester-clad
used-car
salesman - insincere, cajoling, slimy, slippery, sleazy, sticky -- and
that's the singing -- a raw deal.]
Blitzkrieg-style Public Relations, Marketing, and now
Blue-Collar/Working-Class Cheap Labor (and the aesthetics, or lack of,
of - see "Flanigan, Lauren" - see "Slavs") have been summoned to the
cause of salvaging something or other from the debris of these
self-appointed "opera/music lovers'" own making. And so the armies of
businessmen have landed triumphantly with portfolios chock-full with
the truly untriumphant, the amateurs, the pedigree-less, the
unaccomplished, the homogeneous, the vocally faceless, the emaciated,
the pretty, the photogenic, the grotesque too, the church rodents, the
H.I.P.-voiced, the H.I.P.-mannered, the pedigree-less, the correct,
the obedient, the mega amplified, the firefighters, the policemen, the
construction workers, the factory slaves, the custodians, the
industrial quality, the white trash, the divas next door; the divas
next door with the cute children as gimmicks; the divas next door who
are so nice and behave so well and who must reassure us about it; the
divas next door who seek psychotherapy and then have the distaste to
announce it; the divas next door who relax to the Dixie Chicks; the
vedettes next door who love all that jazz and then scat and squat
through e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g that is European a-n-d Classical (and
not) --- but then, in music that requires precisely that, the phlegm
gets in
the way of that thang called swing; the divas next door who thrive on
wrestling, meatloaf, and fish n' chips --- and show it; the divas next
door who marry well, transgenderly; the divas next door who, although
already in their 40s and beyond, must appease us by "taking baby steps
Criticism or Analysis but Lowest-Common-Denominator Public Relations
Spin [and worse: the fixation with that elusive something known as
---technique--- technique and organization and perfection as ends in
themselves: music-making as athletic match: missing the forest for the
trees --- but this is another angle for another day]. So much so that
it has become strangely and suddenly K-o-s-h-e-r once more (Jesus!,
how many more times are we going to hear about market
over-saturation?) to make records (remember when you and I were
advised to swiftly r-e-j-e-c-t, wholesale, them records [or
anything, for that matter] by or with Cheryl Studer becuz they were
everything from digital to illusion to un-necessary to in-competent to
im-personal to contrived to in-experienced to un-felt to
perfect to dull to null to this to that to that to this - beautiful
even? --- you know, the toxic byproduct of uncontained Kapitalismus -
the same Kapitalismus that gave us such goodies as Meyerbeer,
penicillin, opera glasses, the megaphone, the horn, the microphone,
the photograph, the ("fideistic") Mapleson cylinders, the phonograph,
the light bulb, animated pictures, the telegraph, the typewriter,
carbon paper, the telephone, the clock, the metronome, the radio, the
television, faster trains, the automobile, the jet plane, robots,
rockets, missiles, bombs, Star Wars, frying bacon, monaural sound,
analog tech, reel-to-reels, 8-tracks, the cassette, the LP, stereo
sound, surround sound, faxes, overnight mail, the (unfortunate and
devastating to the testimonials of a vast majority of contemporary
artists) digital tech, the PC, laptops, lapdogs, the CD, the walkman,
the minidisc, the CD-ROM, the famous (pitch re-engineered) Richter
confusion among consumers? In opera titles alone, they have recorded
yet
a-n-e-w: Boheme, Fidelio, Butterfly, Tosca, Flying Dutchman, Barber of
Seville, Aida, Rigoletto, Magic Flute, and on and on and on. Correct
us if we are wrong but these bread and butter works were not lacking
in existing documentation, whether historical or not, hysterical or
not, distinguished or not, low end or not. And the combined sad
Sergio Segalini
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
3B. Let us cut to the chase: we propose that one big real reason for
the present-day crisis is that the ever-so-important anecdotal
experience of the live stage experience a-n-d the documented
legacies of certain important big-names (those immediately preceding
the generation of today's so-called "A List") literally fell through a
g-e-n-e-r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l c-r-a-c-k. In the realm of opera, this
previous generation came "too soon" after the Marias and the Renatas
and the Joans and the Montserrats and the Vickys and the Mirellas and
the Regines and whoever....and "too late" for today's democratic
free-for-all (think of the deregulation of the airline industry in the
U.S.A. - surely it
is cheaper to fly and with more options but the experience is ghastly)
in deadly mix with the quick fixes and seductions of Hyper Public
Relations, Hyper Text, and Cyberspace. Few artists can survive without
some form of critical and popular encouragement. It became fashionable
sport (nah, Mob Rule - nah, Olympics) for too influential but equally
ignorant, tin-eared and incredibly, corrosively partial critics and
their bedroom partners to
transposer-conductor-intendant-voicecompetitor-crossoverputa-moviemogul-realestatemagnate-restaurateur-sexsymbol-jetsetter
(all in one and one for all and all in a night) nor lazy nor shrinking
violet nor daddy's lil' lass nor mystic nor minimalist nor hyperbole
nor Überfeminist nor Konzept nor dreams and fables nor metaphysics nor
philosopher ("Philosophier' Er nicht, Herr Schatz...") nor scholar
(nor pretender) nor didact nor pedant nor peasant nor composer (you
know, like Callas, who wrote all them masterpieces now falsely
ascribed to one Bellini, one Donizetti, and one other Verdi) nor
paladin of the glorious avant-garde nor rarity rat nor rat tat tat nor
archaeologist nor room temperature nor Sponsored By Talbots nor
Anglican Service nor Vivaldi postcard nor Handel MBA [opera's answer
to the 80s business phenomenon - everyone has one] nor Britten MD nor
- to promote future handholding) nor married to one nor Adler Fella
[Imagine, if you dare.]
[God Willing.]
[Discuss, if you dare.]
sound-engineering-bag-of-tricks-wise) DECCA/Solti Ring, naXos,
andante.com, 12,000 other music websites, the pirates, special
effects, the VHS, HTML, the WWW, Apples, TV dinners, Windows, the cell
phone, the LD, the DVD, MP3s, Opera In The Original (that's English to
you,
naturally and perennially), CNN operas, Vilar titles, Vilar
Helmut Fischer
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
2nd season in a row - not a bad thing when you try to remember those
Scheiße AIDAs at the MET where Crayola sang the notes and none of the
music - and let's not start about the brutal stupor that was
Pavarotti] b-u-t the visceral collision") - you know the skit - why
transposer-conductor-intendant-voicecompetitor-crossover-moviemogul-realestatemagnate-restaurateur-sexsymbol-jetsetter
[Imagine, if you dare.]
[God Willing.]
[Discuss, if you dare.]
Tebaldi, Sutherland, or Caballé, to name but a few, in this manner?
Helmut Fischer
Helmut Fischer
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
3B. Let us cut to the chase: we propose that one big reason for
the present-day crisis is that the ever-so-important anecdotal
experience of the live stage experiences a-n-d documented
Scheiße AIDAs at the MET where Crayola connected them dots and none of
the
music - not to mention the brutal stupor that were
Pavarotti and the ever-accomodating Levine] b-u-t the visceral
Cardiff-Domingo-RichieTucker-BelleSilverman-Albanese-Horne-Scotto-vonStade-Heggie-VeraRosza
[Imagine, if you dare.]
[God Willing.]
- we are losing count -, Best Friends & Co. Inc. Ltd. S.A. GmbH - the
[Discuss, if you dare.]
organically-grown, FDA approved, anodyne, pastel, and drab as
Helmut Fischer
Helmut Fischer
wrote....
... blah blah blah.....
Sorry for having to crosspost, but I just have emphazise that not I, but the
troll Pineiro Gabriel Bocanegra has posted that message, again impersonating
me by using a yahoo-address, as he had done already countless times before.
Same old boring story!
Greetings from Vienna,
Helmut Fischer
Helmut Fischer
wrote....
... blah blah blah.....
Again I just have emphazise that not I, but the
troll Pineiro Gabriel Bocanegra has posted that message, again impersonating
me (and others) by using a yahoo-address, as he had done already countless
Helmut Fischer
Lucifer
just read therein what they want anyway. And every time it is the same
thing. And every time it is the same thing. Pfui.
Helmut Fischer
Helmut Fischer
David Shengold
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
Cardiff-Domingo-RichieTucker-BelleSilverman-Albanese-Horne-Scotto-vonStade-Heggie-VeraRosza-GeorgeLondon
Michael Barclay
--- Arturo Toscanini
----------------------------
http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0009D&L=opera-l&P=R10995
Thus spoke the authority:
We ask:
We comment and ask:
Cardiff-VeraRosza-Domingo-GeorgeLondon-RichieTucker-BelleSilverman-Albanese-Horne-Scotto-vonStade-Heggie