Verizon Hall
Philadelphia Orchestra. Wagner/Beethoven/Brahms program
The program notes that Schoenberg wanted the strings out from under the virtuosity of the piano passages of Brahms’ Piano Quartet No. 1. Result is both captivating and frustrating because you yearn to hear those piano scales with all of their diamond hard clarity. But, this is a musical tryst to remember. Loved the clamorous sonic drapery of the 2nd movement.
MaestroAndrey Boreyko builds the drama with beautiful detailing, not completely evading some sloshy symphonic soup. The Intermezzo is ponderous even for Brahms.
But, what a first rate 4th movement rondo, played with such character style and thrilling tempi. The flute and string roulades that broke into a rowdy Hungarian dance.
11.29.2008
11.28.2008
gyro 3v.
In an undisclosed location.
There are also roused diseases like
Ebola shaken
Out from under the tropical canopy
These diseases,
if disturbed enough
Can transmutate to human.
Something that astounded virologists
until they admitted they
were behind the science, again.
C’est la vie
Microbes, microbes
And we all fall down
I’m thinking that I will eat shit.
:Gabbros excavated from
The Pacific Ocean floor
West of Costa Rica
Were formed from
Magma that boiled out from the core
15 million years ago
Now pebbles that
Are extra pieces:
There are also roused diseases like
Ebola shaken
Out from under the tropical canopy
These diseases,
if disturbed enough
Can transmutate to human.
Something that astounded virologists
until they admitted they
were behind the science, again.
C’est la vie
Microbes, microbes
And we all fall down
I’m thinking that I will eat shit.
:Gabbros excavated from
The Pacific Ocean floor
West of Costa Rica
Were formed from
Magma that boiled out from the core
15 million years ago
Now pebbles that
Are extra pieces:
diary entry
My cable is off, so I'm hearing just the headlines on NPR, but in a lot of ways that is better. Hearing the news from India, it's hard not to hate those who destroy others in the name of their own politics, beliefs, country or religion. Hard to stay involved with life really, because it is so ugly at times. But we must fight any impulse to be passive and we must stand for peace in the world.
11.27.2008
Milk it
Deflected invitations for Thanksgiving and wasn't able to drive to see my mother, so I played holiday hooky- ignored dls, went to Sweat, then to see Sean Penn in Milk. A great part for him and he milks it with everything he has. He'll get the oscar for this one. Operatic in its intensitity and full of the stations of the gay cross. Absolutely loved it. Beautiful performances from Mr. Penn and James Franco who plays Milk's his first lover Scott. Kept forgetting that Mr. Franco isn't the reincarnation of another James. Josh Brolin is hypnotic as Dan White, should snag him an oscar nod.
Not holding the tears back at reliving what GLBT America lost when Harvey Milk was gunned down. Harvey's speeches still resonate today.
Not holding the tears back at reliving what GLBT America lost when Harvey Milk was gunned down. Harvey's speeches still resonate today.
11.26.2008
upcoming poss.- C I Mag
CI or Cave-In:
Reference of appearance or behavior that provides evidence that said person has
imploded, whether they acknowledge it or not. (Me out in a blizzard, clutching a box of wine, in desperation for a drink would be an example. Multiple face-lifts would be another.) Might have to use roman a clef to avoid lawsuits.
Speaking of cave-ins- can you believe that gasbag Rush Limbaugh is still emitting megamethane into the atmosphere. What will it take for him to go away.
Bernstein bill and a little Lenny
Carnegie Hall, 11/14
At the Metropolitan Opera’s final performance of Dr. Atomic, if you were seated in the side balcony, it was hard to take your eyes off of conductor Alan Gilbert, he was so connected to every aspect of the performance, commanding in every detail.
Not that he is dancy or lording over the pit and audience, rather, he maintained a steeled exactness delivering John Adam’s seismic score. It was so interesting to see him in front of the New York Philharmonic the following night at Carnegie Hall.
On this occasion Gilbert was hopping around trying to coax expression and control out of his orchestra celebrating the music of Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein would have loved his the brutal wiliness of Dr. Atomic, but perhaps would have been less thrilled with the waywardness of this program.
Bernstein’s score to ‘On the Waterfront’ may have been a rough cut for the composer in Elia Kazan’s classic film, but it is nonetheless a compelling narrative work for the concert hall. It can evoke images and drama from the movie, but can be cut free as well. The Philharmonic is relied on the cinematic narrative progression, was tentative instead of subtle. The jazz structures, are completely dimensionless as played; the city fanfares just loud, when they should be driving. It bloomed more cohesively in the back half. There is even eloquence, as the orchestra thunders during the end passages, you could see a bloodied Brando (if not Bernstein) making his was through the crowd.
The most interesting work on the program is Serenade (after Plato’s Symposium) with violinist Glenn Dicterow. The entrance solo by Dicterow, posing Bernstein’s philosophical questions, is beautifully essayed by Dicterow. From there, the Philharmonic is scrambled in the more ponderous enclaves, all the more jarring because they play some pretty tight passages. Dicterow settles in to an academic performance, that frequently framed muddy orchestral hand-offs.
Perhaps it seemed more glaring with such fresh memory of the thicket of colliding ideas in Dr. Atomic that Gilbert effortlessly controlled the night before. Last month, Loren Maazel conducted the NY Philharmonic in an all Tchaikovsky program in Philadelphia that was erratic in similar ways.
Who doesn’t love Bernstein’s score to ‘West Side Story’ but on this night it came off as completely gratuitous, teetering on being a crashing bore. Soprano Ana Maria Martinez and tenor Paul Groves left any chemistry offstage for their stiff duets in Suite No. 1. Groves was all goofy earnestness singing ‘Maria.’ The singers fared better on ‘One Hand, One Heart’ with moments of gorgeous vocal blending that was marred by their clunky body language. They sang ‘Somewhere’ like an art song, instead of a communal manifesto.
‘Suite No. 2’ had more life thanks to New York Choral Artists. Martinez loosened up for the always treacly in concert ’I Feel Pretty’ helped by three spirited women from the chorus. There is such charming faux swagger by the men for the ‘Jet Song’ but fellas, a little more vocal threat wouldn’t hurt. But what do I know, Gilbert obviously connected, and the audience begged for more, which fortunately kicked the concert into Bernstein cruise control.
Sheryl Staples, concertmaster, cues the orchestra for ’Candide’ with the conductor's stand vacant, in tribute to Bernstein. Presto, Lenny’s glitter and sarcasm was all in place. The fun remained in spades for ‘Mambo’ the orchestra both bongo cool, the chorus rowdy and the hipsters really airing out Lenny’s best imitation of Basie.
At the Metropolitan Opera’s final performance of Dr. Atomic, if you were seated in the side balcony, it was hard to take your eyes off of conductor Alan Gilbert, he was so connected to every aspect of the performance, commanding in every detail.
Not that he is dancy or lording over the pit and audience, rather, he maintained a steeled exactness delivering John Adam’s seismic score. It was so interesting to see him in front of the New York Philharmonic the following night at Carnegie Hall.
On this occasion Gilbert was hopping around trying to coax expression and control out of his orchestra celebrating the music of Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein would have loved his the brutal wiliness of Dr. Atomic, but perhaps would have been less thrilled with the waywardness of this program.
Bernstein’s score to ‘On the Waterfront’ may have been a rough cut for the composer in Elia Kazan’s classic film, but it is nonetheless a compelling narrative work for the concert hall. It can evoke images and drama from the movie, but can be cut free as well. The Philharmonic is relied on the cinematic narrative progression, was tentative instead of subtle. The jazz structures, are completely dimensionless as played; the city fanfares just loud, when they should be driving. It bloomed more cohesively in the back half. There is even eloquence, as the orchestra thunders during the end passages, you could see a bloodied Brando (if not Bernstein) making his was through the crowd.
The most interesting work on the program is Serenade (after Plato’s Symposium) with violinist Glenn Dicterow. The entrance solo by Dicterow, posing Bernstein’s philosophical questions, is beautifully essayed by Dicterow. From there, the Philharmonic is scrambled in the more ponderous enclaves, all the more jarring because they play some pretty tight passages. Dicterow settles in to an academic performance, that frequently framed muddy orchestral hand-offs.
Perhaps it seemed more glaring with such fresh memory of the thicket of colliding ideas in Dr. Atomic that Gilbert effortlessly controlled the night before. Last month, Loren Maazel conducted the NY Philharmonic in an all Tchaikovsky program in Philadelphia that was erratic in similar ways.
Who doesn’t love Bernstein’s score to ‘West Side Story’ but on this night it came off as completely gratuitous, teetering on being a crashing bore. Soprano Ana Maria Martinez and tenor Paul Groves left any chemistry offstage for their stiff duets in Suite No. 1. Groves was all goofy earnestness singing ‘Maria.’ The singers fared better on ‘One Hand, One Heart’ with moments of gorgeous vocal blending that was marred by their clunky body language. They sang ‘Somewhere’ like an art song, instead of a communal manifesto.
‘Suite No. 2’ had more life thanks to New York Choral Artists. Martinez loosened up for the always treacly in concert ’I Feel Pretty’ helped by three spirited women from the chorus. There is such charming faux swagger by the men for the ‘Jet Song’ but fellas, a little more vocal threat wouldn’t hurt. But what do I know, Gilbert obviously connected, and the audience begged for more, which fortunately kicked the concert into Bernstein cruise control.
Sheryl Staples, concertmaster, cues the orchestra for ’Candide’ with the conductor's stand vacant, in tribute to Bernstein. Presto, Lenny’s glitter and sarcasm was all in place. The fun remained in spades for ‘Mambo’ the orchestra both bongo cool, the chorus rowdy and the hipsters really airing out Lenny’s best imitation of Basie.
11.25.2008
The Philadelphia diaries
Diving back into articles and other projects to fill out the writing year, but a little concerned that I am written out. Want to finish 'The Ladies of Newport' and have done, but cannot settle on that fait a compli otherwise known as the third act.
Talked to Mark Wolverton about his new bio 'A Life in Twilight' about J. Robert Oppenheimer's years in unofficial exile. Getting a crash course on Oppenheimer with Dr. Atomic last week at the Met, reviewing the upcoming PBS documentary 'Wonders are Many: The Making of Dr. Atomic' and reading Mr. Wolverton's book.
LOTD- Nuclear Wagner
Talked to Mark Wolverton about his new bio 'A Life in Twilight' about J. Robert Oppenheimer's years in unofficial exile. Getting a crash course on Oppenheimer with Dr. Atomic last week at the Met, reviewing the upcoming PBS documentary 'Wonders are Many: The Making of Dr. Atomic' and reading Mr. Wolverton's book.
LOTD- Nuclear Wagner
Ode to Dorothy Parker
Is that the city sinking?
I heard it sink before
When I walked home from your
Hospital room
unable to face the morgue
Is that my mother crying?
I thought I recognized that song
She whispered it in a lullaby the night her grandmother was gone.
Is a vanquished soul with me tonight
As the rumble becomes clear
Will I live with them in the after night
when the depth remain permanently unclear
Is that my mind approaching
I think I recognize its fate
That piteous fear awakened the consciousness escaped
Is that our bodies
Wrestling to permanently encoil?
(A thought of pristine emotion)
Or the sweaty descent to the boil.
Is that my breast beating
Or my mother’s breast
No, the streets are gone again
Still vanishing in
Your full silhouette.
I heard it sink before
When I walked home from your
Hospital room
unable to face the morgue
Is that my mother crying?
I thought I recognized that song
She whispered it in a lullaby the night her grandmother was gone.
Is a vanquished soul with me tonight
As the rumble becomes clear
Will I live with them in the after night
when the depth remain permanently unclear
Is that my mind approaching
I think I recognize its fate
That piteous fear awakened the consciousness escaped
Is that our bodies
Wrestling to permanently encoil?
(A thought of pristine emotion)
Or the sweaty descent to the boil.
Is that my breast beating
Or my mother’s breast
No, the streets are gone again
Still vanishing in
Your full silhouette.
11.24.2008
Gryroscopes.2v.
When I twist into fetal cry past REM
Under the rocks
Remains of a fish with eight fingers developed
Under its 60s Dior flare of fins
Scientists suggest that
This singular amphibian
used these digits to pan
For ecological gold through
the silt in search of food.
Geologist must now insert a new found age in their
Paleolithic cross-sections.
The sex is unrevealed,
Though there are rumors of reptilian
Transexualism, gods forbid
So I think we have a show.
The trace remains of an instinct that
Requires me to search for my mutant destiny
Under the rocks
Remains of a fish with eight fingers developed
Under its 60s Dior flare of fins
Scientists suggest that
This singular amphibian
used these digits to pan
For ecological gold through
the silt in search of food.
Geologist must now insert a new found age in their
Paleolithic cross-sections.
The sex is unrevealed,
Though there are rumors of reptilian
Transexualism, gods forbid
So I think we have a show.
The trace remains of an instinct that
Requires me to search for my mutant destiny
Fetash-
Fetash- accidental variant of fetish, accented on my returning lisp. Pseudonym - Fetasch. nonsequitor.
noted by Kelly at L2 restaurant when I tried to order something funny.
noted by Kelly at L2 restaurant when I tried to order something funny.
Flesh & the devil in Faustian details
La Damnation de Faust
Nov. 10, Met, Lincoln Center NY
Opera Company of Philadelphia’s Robert Driver directed Fidelio for the first time in his 40 year career because he had the opportunity to present a high concept production design that he felt pointed to the specific musical challenges the opera presented.
Driver collaborated with conceptual artist Jan Kaneko to come up with a minimalist multi-tech art installation for the set. The reaction from critic and the public was mixed. For some, the starkness and neutrality completely served Driver’s purpose, but for many, the minimalism was a complete distraction.
There is no split decision on the production designs for Robert Lepage’s production of ‘La Damnation de Faust' which just concluded a successful run at the Metropolitan Opera. It is a hi-def, state of the cirque art, complete distraction.
Set designer Carl Fillion is Lepage’s stage alchemist and he creates a bounty of stunning stage pictures. The four-tier 24 cube matrix, is the backdrop to multi tech film elements.
The Met orchestra is subjugated from the scale of this, which, considering the epically wily scale of Berlioz’s structure is perplexing. Not that James Levine didn’t try to hold sway with a mostly rote lushness especially in the choral sections. Chorus and orchestra together had the might to face off grandly with the set.
The physical production may make this a Faust for its time, but it also blatantly overwhelms the music. Marcello Giordani, a tenor, maintains Faust’s intense vocal serenity in the opening scenes, as he contemplates his suicide, that draws one into the nuances, even as the set opens up into a series of cinematic distractions. Later, his vocal performance seemed unfocused and, his characterization lacked dimension. Perhaps it was one of the tech miscues or some of the thuds from backstage. Eventually, he vocally ducks out of the way of the spectacale.
John Relyea fared better as Mephistopheles, even in a Members Only oxblood waistcoat and plumed hat, has an Errol Flynn swagger that is more devilish than dark. Relyea’s bass-baritone is fully charged in the role. When he does flash his evilness in brief moments, he make it count.
Susan Graham’s fine mezzo-Margeurite, is detached and roaming through the rooms of an shockingly unimpressive estate, she triumphs in her own zone.
Both Ms. Graham and Mr. Giordani are unengaged in their key love scene, tentative, even vocally ackward. In contrast Graham’s live feed spectral image was being engulfed in flames in back of her but her voice was a lazar beam of ariatic control.
Choreography isn’t usually front and center in opera, but co-choreographers Johanne Madore and Alain Gauthier’s dances are just too campy to ignore. Garrotted soldiers descend on the laps of seated women auditioning for Martha Graham’s Lamentation. Later, The devil summons his Solid Gold ballerinas for some epileptic arabesques and scrambled twirling. And then there are those harnessed demons flying in ala Cirque du Soleil. Buff and crowd pleasing.
Even with some tech problems, Lepage’s direction is surprisingly cohesive thanks to the designs concept. Berlioz created his own symphonic montage of scenes and Holger Forterer and Boris Firquet’s video and image designs, as well as Sonoyo Nishikawa’s vivid lighting, provide inventive narrative threads.
Hell is realized, through simple stagecraft and mighty music, with a phalanx of naked men, singing Berlioz’s devil-speak, with an orchestra boiling over. For heaven, Maestro Levine is so committed to reach musical beautification for Margaurite’s ascension, that he seems possessed.
It would be interesting to hear this orchestra play Faust where all of the flesh and the devil remained in the pit.
Nov. 10, Met, Lincoln Center NY
Opera Company of Philadelphia’s Robert Driver directed Fidelio for the first time in his 40 year career because he had the opportunity to present a high concept production design that he felt pointed to the specific musical challenges the opera presented.
Driver collaborated with conceptual artist Jan Kaneko to come up with a minimalist multi-tech art installation for the set. The reaction from critic and the public was mixed. For some, the starkness and neutrality completely served Driver’s purpose, but for many, the minimalism was a complete distraction.
There is no split decision on the production designs for Robert Lepage’s production of ‘La Damnation de Faust' which just concluded a successful run at the Metropolitan Opera. It is a hi-def, state of the cirque art, complete distraction.
Set designer Carl Fillion is Lepage’s stage alchemist and he creates a bounty of stunning stage pictures. The four-tier 24 cube matrix, is the backdrop to multi tech film elements.
The Met orchestra is subjugated from the scale of this, which, considering the epically wily scale of Berlioz’s structure is perplexing. Not that James Levine didn’t try to hold sway with a mostly rote lushness especially in the choral sections. Chorus and orchestra together had the might to face off grandly with the set.
The physical production may make this a Faust for its time, but it also blatantly overwhelms the music. Marcello Giordani, a tenor, maintains Faust’s intense vocal serenity in the opening scenes, as he contemplates his suicide, that draws one into the nuances, even as the set opens up into a series of cinematic distractions. Later, his vocal performance seemed unfocused and, his characterization lacked dimension. Perhaps it was one of the tech miscues or some of the thuds from backstage. Eventually, he vocally ducks out of the way of the spectacale.
John Relyea fared better as Mephistopheles, even in a Members Only oxblood waistcoat and plumed hat, has an Errol Flynn swagger that is more devilish than dark. Relyea’s bass-baritone is fully charged in the role. When he does flash his evilness in brief moments, he make it count.
Susan Graham’s fine mezzo-Margeurite, is detached and roaming through the rooms of an shockingly unimpressive estate, she triumphs in her own zone.
Both Ms. Graham and Mr. Giordani are unengaged in their key love scene, tentative, even vocally ackward. In contrast Graham’s live feed spectral image was being engulfed in flames in back of her but her voice was a lazar beam of ariatic control.
Choreography isn’t usually front and center in opera, but co-choreographers Johanne Madore and Alain Gauthier’s dances are just too campy to ignore. Garrotted soldiers descend on the laps of seated women auditioning for Martha Graham’s Lamentation. Later, The devil summons his Solid Gold ballerinas for some epileptic arabesques and scrambled twirling. And then there are those harnessed demons flying in ala Cirque du Soleil. Buff and crowd pleasing.
Even with some tech problems, Lepage’s direction is surprisingly cohesive thanks to the designs concept. Berlioz created his own symphonic montage of scenes and Holger Forterer and Boris Firquet’s video and image designs, as well as Sonoyo Nishikawa’s vivid lighting, provide inventive narrative threads.
Hell is realized, through simple stagecraft and mighty music, with a phalanx of naked men, singing Berlioz’s devil-speak, with an orchestra boiling over. For heaven, Maestro Levine is so committed to reach musical beautification for Margaurite’s ascension, that he seems possessed.
It would be interesting to hear this orchestra play Faust where all of the flesh and the devil remained in the pit.
11.23.2008
Gryroscopes install.
from
Gyroscopes
There are over
One hundred billion
More galaxies than we know about
and astronomers have suggested
The amount may increase as they sift through
Fossils-dust and tumbleweeds
In the after image of exploding nova
That appear on red interstellar transmissions.
wormholes
Dwarf sosess
radio novas
darkmatter
Blackholes
/texasT
Barefoot not to trip
Negative light-
blank perspective
Vanishes at azimuths
The chimera
Tango past horizon
flash over
Reckoning of monstrous
Secrets of human life.
The success of replicated cells
Pure Burlesque
referred to as
Cloning with
Micro-biologist claiming a
exponential curdling.
So we’ve become rattly
and feeding on each other
I sang that song and
found that the feasts of vermin
Live somewhere in my heart even now.
gyroscopes continues later
Gyroscopes
There are over
One hundred billion
More galaxies than we know about
and astronomers have suggested
The amount may increase as they sift through
Fossils-dust and tumbleweeds
In the after image of exploding nova
That appear on red interstellar transmissions.
wormholes
Dwarf sosess
radio novas
darkmatter
Blackholes
/texasT
Barefoot not to trip
Negative light-
blank perspective
Vanishes at azimuths
The chimera
Tango past horizon
flash over
Reckoning of monstrous
Secrets of human life.
The success of replicated cells
Pure Burlesque
referred to as
Cloning with
Micro-biologist claiming a
exponential curdling.
So we’ve become rattly
and feeding on each other
I sang that song and
found that the feasts of vermin
Live somewhere in my heart even now.
gyroscopes continues later
performance notes
Jeremy Denk, concert pianist and metroblogger, played Beethoven's Hammerklavier and Ives' Concord Sonata in Zankel Hall on Nov. 11. his encore was the Alcotts movement of Ives'
Denk's breaks in both pieces reminded me of a figther gathering himself for different opponents. Like a great fighter, he was rapturous in the technical precision that both pieces required.
Jeremy Denk, concert pianist and metroblogger, played Beethoven's Hammerklavier and Ives' Concord Sonata in Zankel Hall on Nov. 11. his encore was the Alcotts movement of Ives'
Denk's breaks in both pieces reminded me of a figther gathering himself for different opponents. Like a great fighter, he was rapturous in the technical precision that both pieces required.
11.22.2008
Remembances of the promises and despair of the 60s on the 45th observance of the death of President Kennedy. My much feared depression era 5th grade teacher Mrs. Blake, came into the classroom after lunch and announced that President Kennedy had been killed. Her stony deportment completely gone, she cried as she was telling us. A moment later she punched a kid in the mouth for his nervous laughter at the news.
lobbies&curtains
The Academy of Music chandelier is back to its restored glory. Can't wait until they start lowering and raising it to cue the curtain ala The Met.
Ran into Walter Dallas, premiere Philadelphia theater & opera director, at 'The Italian Girl in Algiers' who is set to direct a new play in DC, this spring.
Ran into Walter Dallas, premiere Philadelphia theater & opera director, at 'The Italian Girl in Algiers' who is set to direct a new play in DC, this spring.
Chet Plays the Mercury L
Chet Plays the Mercury L
Before the rain
Eroded a
Whisper ballade
The private pictures
in sordid songs
About stupid hearts and
Busted scales
Trashed in
drop dead lipsticks
Chipped onyx cufflinks,
Silver-lined
deco cigarette cases
Passed on by
Discarded lovers
Thrown through smoke
Of scared promises
Playing the whispered psalms of a
Cobalt wind.
Not singing
Driving a pink panel
55-crome
Chevy convertible
your Lakehair
Playing cello
wind tide on
His lap and
you make him hum
‘Where or When.’
As you kick your shoes off
Of the window to feel the
Wind between your blond toes
Or Else he pisses you off and
His horn can lead him in
A scarred melody about you
He’s locked in his room
And the management has seized his luggage
So he works on a song
Not ‘Where or when’
Slunk in a suitcase
But the brow
Of toppling raven hair
sweating
The expiration of
Notes left cradling
his trumpet in that flat.
Before the rain
Eroded a
Whisper ballade
The private pictures
in sordid songs
About stupid hearts and
Busted scales
Trashed in
drop dead lipsticks
Chipped onyx cufflinks,
Silver-lined
deco cigarette cases
Passed on by
Discarded lovers
Thrown through smoke
Of scared promises
Playing the whispered psalms of a
Cobalt wind.
Not singing
Driving a pink panel
55-crome
Chevy convertible
your Lakehair
Playing cello
wind tide on
His lap and
you make him hum
‘Where or When.’
As you kick your shoes off
Of the window to feel the
Wind between your blond toes
Or Else he pisses you off and
His horn can lead him in
A scarred melody about you
He’s locked in his room
And the management has seized his luggage
So he works on a song
Not ‘Where or when’
Slunk in a suitcase
But the brow
Of toppling raven hair
sweating
The expiration of
Notes left cradling
his trumpet in that flat.
Ute's boa journey
belated LOTD
sung in Joe's Pub
The vamp history of Ute Lemper's fuschia cabaret boa tracking it through the Weimar Republic, through wars, affairs, divas and momentarily to Sarah Palin.
sung in Joe's Pub
The vamp history of Ute Lemper's fuschia cabaret boa tracking it through the Weimar Republic, through wars, affairs, divas and momentarily to Sarah Palin.
(photo- KarenMoorman)
11.21.2008
Roulades & Yuks
Opera Company of Philadelphia
The Italian Girl in Algiers
11/21/08
Busty, bawdy and as gay as Liberace in Casablanca, the Opera Company of Philadelphia all but sets the rainbow drapes on fire for Rossini’s ‘The Italian Girl in Algiers.’
For those who don’t know the story there is a built in harem in heat for the rotund Mustafa, who is looking for foreign ‘bon-bons’ to play in his palace. His pirates pillage for him on the high seas. His dressers are so fey they jete in the new silks.
But Isabella wasn't pushed around on the boot or in Algiers. She’s a femme fatale that can whither swords both steel & flesh. Making the best of a shipwreck, she is going to do some pillaging of her own. A Mezzo-tranian farce ensues as she dupes pirates, eunuchs, sultans and the Mediterranean hoi polloi.
It may be stooge opera, but this cast can boast a lot of great singing headed by Ruxandra Donose, a fine mezzo who camps and vamps it up every moment. Lawrence Brownlee, equals with a commanding tenor as her lovelorn secret love. The singers starred in OCP's Cinderella on 2006.
Daniel Belcher, a flings his foppish baritone about with nimble comic acting, posing as Isabella’s uncle instead of her lover to save himself from being impaled. The phallic jokes get so literal that guardsmen actually polish their spears.
Kevin Glavin uses his buffo bass to every advantage as Mustafa, that has him spooning and mugging like Curly one minute and checking out his butt in the mirror the next. And the man can work his turbans, whether they look like Mars attacks or a Carmen Miranda knockoff.
Rossini’s quintets and quartets are sung with gusto and sharpness by this able lead cast. Atop rolling cubes in one scene, they are rolled around the stage by slaves and it becomes vocal jousting from every angle.
Credit such meaty moments to director Stefano Vizioli. Corrado Rovaris, OCP’s resident conductor specializes in Italian opera and his punctuations are crisp and the clamorous Rossini canter brought to full gallop with one whip.
-Whittington
The Italian Girl in Algiers
11/21/08
Busty, bawdy and as gay as Liberace in Casablanca, the Opera Company of Philadelphia all but sets the rainbow drapes on fire for Rossini’s ‘The Italian Girl in Algiers.’
For those who don’t know the story there is a built in harem in heat for the rotund Mustafa, who is looking for foreign ‘bon-bons’ to play in his palace. His pirates pillage for him on the high seas. His dressers are so fey they jete in the new silks.
But Isabella wasn't pushed around on the boot or in Algiers. She’s a femme fatale that can whither swords both steel & flesh. Making the best of a shipwreck, she is going to do some pillaging of her own. A Mezzo-tranian farce ensues as she dupes pirates, eunuchs, sultans and the Mediterranean hoi polloi.
It may be stooge opera, but this cast can boast a lot of great singing headed by Ruxandra Donose, a fine mezzo who camps and vamps it up every moment. Lawrence Brownlee, equals with a commanding tenor as her lovelorn secret love. The singers starred in OCP's Cinderella on 2006.
Daniel Belcher, a flings his foppish baritone about with nimble comic acting, posing as Isabella’s uncle instead of her lover to save himself from being impaled. The phallic jokes get so literal that guardsmen actually polish their spears.
Kevin Glavin uses his buffo bass to every advantage as Mustafa, that has him spooning and mugging like Curly one minute and checking out his butt in the mirror the next. And the man can work his turbans, whether they look like Mars attacks or a Carmen Miranda knockoff.
Rossini’s quintets and quartets are sung with gusto and sharpness by this able lead cast. Atop rolling cubes in one scene, they are rolled around the stage by slaves and it becomes vocal jousting from every angle.
Credit such meaty moments to director Stefano Vizioli. Corrado Rovaris, OCP’s resident conductor specializes in Italian opera and his punctuations are crisp and the clamorous Rossini canter brought to full gallop with one whip.
-Whittington
a thousand dreams later
Danse Macabre
Down and outward
my gray heart
Gargoyled limbs and swayback
Plies
Wistful discord
Stabbing lights
Silhouettes eat
Fragments of night
Venal lunges and livid eyes
The slack of the bodies
Only the tongues rush by
Vestiges of emotions
In complete undoubt
Violet shadows
Inner sculptures flung out
Promenade flouncing
Flicking the obscure
The minuet of abstract
The savaging
Crashing bore
Seek the devils
With these
Feet and hand
Enfold me into your body
So we are unforeseen
Night creatures who obliterate all along
To that very moment
Before the moment’s gone.
Down and outward
my gray heart
Gargoyled limbs and swayback
Plies
Wistful discord
Stabbing lights
Silhouettes eat
Fragments of night
Venal lunges and livid eyes
The slack of the bodies
Only the tongues rush by
Vestiges of emotions
In complete undoubt
Violet shadows
Inner sculptures flung out
Promenade flouncing
Flicking the obscure
The minuet of abstract
The savaging
Crashing bore
Seek the devils
With these
Feet and hand
Enfold me into your body
So we are unforeseen
Night creatures who obliterate all along
To that very moment
Before the moment’s gone.
Another fouffy poem because I forgot
The Music Rooms
The Lustrous Emotions The Emotion of Luxury
The Luxury of the silence of emotion
lyricism 5/4 4/4 3/2 7/8 damn,
did I will
This fetal beat fragment recalled
Deep in a dream.
another ABpositive blood dream
That starts out like a silent horror movie.
So the afternoon
lies on lies and I hear the guests arriving so I can continue?
Get out or maybe I should
He is of Lustrous Emotions
an O negative to my AB pallor
Almost campy vampiric the night
He inked my body, then
I thought
This is all the same to him
With his body Some neural charge or a radiation afterburn
Architect = Sonic
Keeping them out
Passing a bottle of
‘52 Chateau Margaux back and forth in bed laughing until we were drunk.
Construct of a dirge or maybe the
madrigal of our torsos the valor of our space and time
descending or lurching ostinato
when I left him in
bed with a pointed toe spooling the silk or to return outside my glamour
We get up to have tea.
an overture incessant, a disbelieved fanfare,
a bare-knuckle string battle
He's lit a cigarette without even noticing
the decrescendo in phantom blue for goodnight, sweet shadows
Dance in the smoke
He made the rooms absurdly big for us, there is a
Metallic sound to any whisper
He placed a Louis XIV blood-velvet divan
A dead god lurks under glass
In the gallery, sacred instruments from Nepal
the only other object in the room
is my Steinway
he will look in on me from his distant gallery after the hours and he is naked up there dreaming bringing in a lyre
with his hair lacquered
the
Discord of his strum
our final silence
I heard him once Then forever
He builds and I compose.
For John Way
The Music Rooms is based on portraits of John’s lovers he painted in his NY loft in the 50s.
The Lustrous Emotions The Emotion of Luxury
The Luxury of the silence of emotion
lyricism 5/4 4/4 3/2 7/8 damn,
did I will
This fetal beat fragment recalled
Deep in a dream.
another ABpositive blood dream
That starts out like a silent horror movie.
So the afternoon
lies on lies and I hear the guests arriving so I can continue?
Get out or maybe I should
He is of Lustrous Emotions
an O negative to my AB pallor
Almost campy vampiric the night
He inked my body, then
I thought
This is all the same to him
With his body Some neural charge or a radiation afterburn
Architect = Sonic
Keeping them out
Passing a bottle of
‘52 Chateau Margaux back and forth in bed laughing until we were drunk.
Construct of a dirge or maybe the
madrigal of our torsos the valor of our space and time
descending or lurching ostinato
when I left him in
bed with a pointed toe spooling the silk or to return outside my glamour
We get up to have tea.
an overture incessant, a disbelieved fanfare,
a bare-knuckle string battle
He's lit a cigarette without even noticing
the decrescendo in phantom blue for goodnight, sweet shadows
Dance in the smoke
He made the rooms absurdly big for us, there is a
Metallic sound to any whisper
He placed a Louis XIV blood-velvet divan
A dead god lurks under glass
In the gallery, sacred instruments from Nepal
the only other object in the room
is my Steinway
he will look in on me from his distant gallery after the hours and he is naked up there dreaming bringing in a lyre
with his hair lacquered
the
Discord of his strum
our final silence
I heard him once Then forever
He builds and I compose.
For John Way
The Music Rooms is based on portraits of John’s lovers he painted in his NY loft in the 50s.
11.20.2008
Invocation
A favorite poem to launch this public diary.
I don't know from blogs, but I've jumped off bridges before.
As a diarist, I've used the Isherwood-Rorem- gay model of formless entries, but
substantive and hopefully amusing. We'll see. And stealing Donald Vining's 'LOTD' feature.
Often a sketchbook for random notes about performances and performers.
I don't know from blogs, but I've jumped off bridges before.
As a diarist, I've used the Isherwood-Rorem- gay model of formless entries, but
substantive and hopefully amusing. We'll see. And stealing Donald Vining's 'LOTD' feature.
Often a sketchbook for random notes about performances and performers.
In August, Shadow of Janus
In August
Shadow of Janus by Lewis Whittington
The realms of false sky, descending.
Vanquished
upon the metrolights
Hearing the godless
Gods and goddesses
Liars and demons
Souls and the soulless
Blur along the street
Where there is no darkness unseen
No stillness unnoticed
Or forbidden thought forgotten
On these lost paths
I hear Mercury keeping vigil along
The promontory
Igniting the arrowheads,
Brushing his temples
Eyes fixed,
body ready for flight,
whispers
‘Let’s go’ he
Says, ‘for we are the hunted now.’
Ice basilica
At daybreak and
The running flame
That consumes
The haze
Opened to the sudden shade
Pulling away
The corrupt prayers uttered before
The vanished armor
Offering smoke
And it is just in that
Hour, That I know there are no secrets
Unveiled onto this night
Discovered galaxies are
Noticed for a moment then
Passed away from
The moons
So barren that skin and bone
Feel the same
And emotion is
a remembrance of another life
Or dying star
Foretold by Mercury
Tracking
Heathen and Virgo
In the afterburn
I hear them confide
‘What chance.’
I wired Scorpio
So couldn’t
Break the code to
Mean nothing past that moment
To record the laughter at the
Eclipse over Jerusalem.
Cobalt
Silhouettes arch
on the waters
With flights
Of firebirds and
Of deaths
Told in the fanfares of Tatarus
In this music field
Of disgraced tones
Invites a coarser rhythm
I called
‘not a word, Terpsichore.”
The assault
Beats down over
What existed again but not before
And when the music enters
The body
It digs up
An infinite
If
To be met with ideas and peace
Waiting to be lived
By havoc and adornment
Waiting to die and
This is the water music we feel
I see Janus
Azimuths,
Vanished at horizon
Shielding us
From home.
For Jack Nespoli
Shadow of Janus by Lewis Whittington
The realms of false sky, descending.
Vanquished
upon the metrolights
Hearing the godless
Gods and goddesses
Liars and demons
Souls and the soulless
Blur along the street
Where there is no darkness unseen
No stillness unnoticed
Or forbidden thought forgotten
On these lost paths
I hear Mercury keeping vigil along
The promontory
Igniting the arrowheads,
Brushing his temples
Eyes fixed,
body ready for flight,
whispers
‘Let’s go’ he
Says, ‘for we are the hunted now.’
Ice basilica
At daybreak and
The running flame
That consumes
The haze
Opened to the sudden shade
Pulling away
The corrupt prayers uttered before
The vanished armor
Offering smoke
And it is just in that
Hour, That I know there are no secrets
Unveiled onto this night
Discovered galaxies are
Noticed for a moment then
Passed away from
The moons
So barren that skin and bone
Feel the same
And emotion is
a remembrance of another life
Or dying star
Foretold by Mercury
Tracking
Heathen and Virgo
In the afterburn
I hear them confide
‘What chance.’
I wired Scorpio
So couldn’t
Break the code to
Mean nothing past that moment
To record the laughter at the
Eclipse over Jerusalem.
Cobalt
Silhouettes arch
on the waters
With flights
Of firebirds and
Of deaths
Told in the fanfares of Tatarus
In this music field
Of disgraced tones
Invites a coarser rhythm
I called
‘not a word, Terpsichore.”
The assault
Beats down over
What existed again but not before
And when the music enters
The body
It digs up
An infinite
If
To be met with ideas and peace
Waiting to be lived
By havoc and adornment
Waiting to die and
This is the water music we feel
I see Janus
Azimuths,
Vanished at horizon
Shielding us
From home.
For Jack Nespoli
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