No Musicology Yet

I will take a brief moment to discuss the ridiculousness that is the American-born, Canadian-residented Sondra Radvanovsky.

I was mildly obsessed with Sondra (we're on a first name basis clearly) for about a year or so before I saw her last spring break at the Met in Verdi's Il Trovatore. After that performance, I was hooked. Sondra Radvanovsky is THE Verdi soprano of our generation.

What makes a Verdi soprano? Here is a crash course. A Verdi soprano must have the size to cut over the orchestra of Aida, Forza, and Un ballo in maschera, possess the agility for coloratura, have an upper extension to a D-flat (a D if she is to sing Giovanna d'Arco without cuts, or a D#/E-flat if she is to sing the traditional, but not written, 'high notes' of Gilda and Violetta), and have a strong lower extension down to at least an B-flat or A (if she has a low F-sharp for Elena in Vespri then she is everything we have ever needed in life.) The Verdian soprano contains the same 'morbidezza' that we want in verismo - that beautiful, sad quality that pulls at the heart strings and sends our ears into aural rapture! She possesses utter control over her voice navigating Verdi's long melodies (an influence of Bellini to be sure) with exquisite breath control, staying true to the dramatic markings of the score, and coloring her voice to match the dramatic structure of the opera.

A Verdi singer, therefore, isn't just someone who screams in Italian loudly.

Anyway, Sondra possess all of these fabulous things. One of the greatest musical moments of my LIFE was hearing her singing Leonora's Act IV aria "D'amor sull'ali rosée" at the Metropolitan Opera. I don't think she breathed for all five minutes. Her high pianissimi on C's, B-flats, and D-flat were just breath-taking. They literally stopped time. I could not believe what I was hearing. Most amazingly I was in the Family Circle or the 'nosebleed' section, and I could hear her just as well in these pianissimi sections as in her loudest fortissimo. That is amazing.

Equally amazing was her handling of Leonora's death "Prima che d'altri vivere" in which the soprano sings one phrase from a middle voice G to a high, hopefully pianissimo A-flat, and then descending back down. Sondra took what was written on the page, executed it beautifully, and truly made it seem like the breath of life was being sucked from her. Oh, I can't do it justice people! And the amazing thing was that she was not even supposed to be singing at the Met that season.

Thankfully, she will be singing this again at the Met next season as well as Tosca. I will be there as often as I can. What a fabulous artist.

Some choice examples of this amazing singer.

From her CD, Aida's "O patria mia"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9t6fAk-ALc

This may actually be the SAME version that I saw. D'amor sull'ali from Trovatore:

http://www.youtube.com/user/camilla0690#p/search/9/tKnPs3C8sE4

And "Prima che d'altri vivere" (I also thought that Marcelo Alvarez was particularly wonderful.)

http://www.youtube.com/user/camilla0690#p/search/0/-WP2mzokORU

(A brief translation that makes this even more heart breaking "I would rather die yours, then live belonging to someone else!" Everything loses poetry in English. :-(

Showin' off that F# in VESPRI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLungTHZook

Showin' off that E-flat in Traviata!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxWU1sRo55E

And if you have 55 minutes to watch this, please do! She sings everything that needs to be sung...tehe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auZABJ94JN4

NOW ABOUT MY LIFE.

So, one of my fake teeth came out the other day while I was flossing. AWESOME. I got it re-adhered yesterday. Awesome. It came out again today, I bit it, and it broke in two. Great.

So, I got a new tooth today.

What else? Oh, I went in to see my old piano teacher at her music store in Scotch Plains, and her husband and herself want me to start teaching voice lessons at their store. :-) They teach everything but voice, so this is fabulous!

Still no news on the job front. Sent in my application to Avery Fisher Hall, waiting to hear back from Trader Joe's, and I am teaching a voice lesson on Thursday to a nine-year old who likes Lady Gaga. Certainly going to be blogging on THAT, man!

Otherwise, I am spending most of my time studying for my music history diagnostic exam. The basic moral of THAT story is that I cannot stand medieval music. So much conflicting information and interpretations since the time period in general is not well-documented.

Goodnight, y'all. I am going to start reading War and Peace.

Hugs!