Saturday, August 31, 2013

Favorite Arias

Sull'aria, The Marriage of Figaro, by Mozart

As we join our opera, already in progress, the Countess and her maid, Susanna, betrothed to Figaro, servant to the Count, are writing a duplicitous letter to the Count. He has been delaying the marriage of Figaro to Susanna, with the aim of seducing her. With the Countess dictating, Susanna agrees to meet him 'under the pines.'  A comedy of errors ensues.
What a gentle little Zephyr
This evening will sigh
Under the pines in the grove
The rest he will understand. 
I know little of opera, please share your favorite pieces so we might all find new surprises.

Wiki





52 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I just finished watching a very good film called After Lucia (2012)

Netflix, English subtitled.

vza said...

Bizet's
Au fond du temple saint-Les Pecheurs des Perles (Pearl Fishers)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV5zUa4zMnw

Love all the wonderful eclectic posts on this blog!

Palladian said...

I am not much for Italian opera, or much vocal music beyond about 1750...

If I had to name a favorite performance of an "aria" off the top of my head, I'd say Alfred Deller performing "Eternal source of light divine" from Handel's "Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne".

Or perhaps Andreas Scholl singing John Dowland's "Flow My Tears".

Or perhaps Scholl singing Henry Purcell's "O Solitude".

Thank you dearest deborah.

Palladian said...

"O Solitude" is a very important song to me. Since I first heard it in 1999, it has been the anthem of my life. The lyric was written by Antoine Girard de Saint-Amant, and partially translated by Katherine Philips in the 17th century:

O solitude, my sweetest choice!
Places devoted to the night,
Remote from tumult and from noise,
How ye my restless thoughts delight!
O solitude, my sweetest choice!
O heav'ns! what content is mine
To see these trees, which have appear'd
From the nativity of time,
And which all ages have rever'd,
To look today as fresh and green
As when their beauties first were seen.
O, how agreeable a sight
These hanging mountains do appear,
Which th' unhappy would invite
To finish all their sorrows here,
When their hard fate makes them endure
Such woes as only death can cure.
O, how I solitude adore!
That element of noblest wit,
Where I have learnt Apollo's lore,
Without the pains to study it.
For thy sake I in love am grown
With what thy fancy does pursue;
But when I think upon my own,
I hate it for that reason too,
Because it needs must hinder me
From seeing and from serving thee.
O solitude, O how I solitude adore!

The Dude said...

Natalie Dessay FTW. This is a very difficult aria, one that is more often than not done poorly. Natalie is better than most.

The recitative in the rest of the opera sounds like a bad Downfall parody to me. I expect to hear "Schteinah" in there somewhere and then my left hand will start shaking and, well, you know the rest.

The Dude said...

Some are more fickle than others.

An old chestnut, for sure, but what a great tune.

The Dude said...

Because you can never have too much vibrato. Or cowbell.

Plus, that looks like Trooper doing the singing.

rhhardin said...

Monteverdi Orfeo

Unknown said...

I enjoy opera but know very little about it, so I appreciate these selections.

My exposure is more limited to The Rabbit of Seville. (which is great in its own right, but not for musical brilliance.)

ndspinelli said...

Deborah, You continue to impress w/ a variety of great posts.

My grandfather came from a poor family in Bari, Italy. Before he came to this country solo, as a teenager, his father took him to La Scala in Milan to see the great, Enrico Caruso perform La Traviata by Verdi. It's hard for most to understand what a big deal that was. Caruso was the greatest, and La Scala is the mecca of opera.

When you grow up 1st or 2nd generation Italian you have an appreciation of opera. I know less than my old man, my children, very little. But, I have a deep appreciation. The fountains @ the Bellagio in Vegas is a big attraction. The play all types of music. If you have the chance, and they're playing opera[usually a tenor], watch the kids. White, black, Hispanic, Asian are all quiet and smiling. They're getting the visual from the fountain, but unlike any other music played there, the opera reaches them. Great operatic performances reach past our hearts and touch our souls. If you have young kids and/or grandkids, play opera for them.

ndspinelli said...

If you have XM Radio, the opera station is 74. The Pops and Symphony Hall are 75 and 76 respectively. I play those stations almost exclusively in the car. It really helps me deal w/ stupid, left lane hogging, Cheeseheads.

Phil 314 said...

Saw Marriage of Figaro last spring performed by the Arizona Opera. Being only an occasional opera fan I discovered two things during the performance:
1. Damn, this is a long opera (and a pretty light weight story to boot!)
2. No, in spite of the name, there will be no tenor belting out "Figaro, Figaro, Fiiigggaroooo!" (oh yeah, that's the Barber of Seville)

Anonymous said...

I'll slum it with Puccini, Nessun Dorma being the most beautiful aria.

Anonymous said...

My next favorite, Sull'Aria, from The Marriage of Figaro. What famous film was this aria in?

Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

Sorry, I didn't notice that the Sull'Aria was already mentioned in the post, whatever image or video that's embedded in the post isn't showing up on my iPad.

ricpic said...

Is that a Countess or a fullback?

It's all downhill from Vincero! in the world of opera.

deborah said...

Thanks, all! I look forward to looking at them.

ricpic said...

I'm not sure the love of solitude has anything to do with the state a person finds himself in, whether miserable or content. It's more likely part of our makeup from childhood on. Or not part of our makeup. One would think that intelligence (a rich internal life) would dictate a love of solitude yet there are any number of bright people who are gregarious, some compulsively so.

ndspinelli said...

ricpic, It's the introvert/extrovert thing. Very briefly, introverts recharge their batteries w/ solitude. They expend their energy interacting w/ others. Extroverts get their energy via interactions w/ others/ Introverts are more intelligent than extroverts. But, in our culture, extrovert is the preferred demeanor.

deborah said...

Sixty, how do you compare Dessay with this perfomance. Is it just the quality of audio, or does Damrau have more command of the high notes?

YoungHegelian said...

Here's an Handelian charmer from Julius Caesar.

@RH, I'm surprised you didn't post Possente Spirituo from Monteverdi's Orfeo.

deborah said...

Now this is fascinating. Joan Sutherland talks about Maria Callas's voice taking a hit after Callas lost weight. I hadn't known she'd been heavy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llJDRA9Mb4w

Here she sings Habanera (L'amour est un oiseau rebelle) live in 1962.

Finally, here is the remastered version I listen to from The Very Best of Maria Callas. I don't know what year it was performed/recorded.

deborah said...

Very nice, vza. I think I'm going to have to get entire operas on DVD...or attend the real deals!

rhhardin said...

I listened to Orfeo as a kid doing homework, attracted by the instrumental interludes that turned up regularly.

As a result I know every note of all of it.

This turns out to be startling today when another conductor has his own ideas about how the exact melody goes.

I learned it from Krebs in the 1950s, some archiv LP set.

Anonymous said...

I grew up hearing Caruso. My father was a barber, had his own shop and played Caruso or Croatian music all day long. His patrons were quite polite about it and he must've been a good barber because they kept coming back. Doing chores as a kid in the shop was a bit torturous for me, I didn't appreciate opera until much later. I never did learn to like Croatian music.

deborah said...

Thank you, Palladian, those are beautiful. Jumping from your last link, I found this wonder.

The Dude said...

Damrau has incredible power and an amazing ability to nail the pitch of the high notes - it is awe inspiring.

I selected the Dessay version early this morning for two reasons - that version has French subtitles, which makes it so I can understand what is being sung, and it omits all the Kraut argle bargle - really, who can stand to listen to that shit?

I once broke up with a very talented soprano because she kept telling me how much she loved singing German lieder. Stop it - for the love of God - sing in French or Italian or Spanish - anything but Klingon, er German.

But back to the subject at hand - you can see the difference in what the director of each one of those versions was going for. Damrau is brilliant and really expresses the rage her character is feeling.

Here she is in a happier setting.

I have listened to Carmen by Bizet dozens of times and saw in on stage once - it is a great opera.

Saw Tosca at the Sydney Opera House, liked the music and the hall, but the cast left something to be desired.

Saw La Nozze de Figaro in SF, and in Durham, and have seen plenty of other performances in various places over the years. La Boheme should be seen on stage.

If an opera is playing anywhere near you, go see it. You will learn something, even if it is that you didn't care for that performance.

Listen. Pay attention to what you like. Talk to people.

Pavarotti said that he liked Verdi, Monteverdi and Puccini. I would replace Monteverdi with Donizetti, but that's just me.

Just found this one
- one of my all time favorites - about 3:25 in it gets very good. Them Eyeties sure could write a melody, that's for sure.

I could go on all day, but that's more than enough for now.

ndspinelli said...

Sixty, A man of culture. I don't remember this side of you.

The Dude said...

Fuck you, you mozzarella eatin', garlic-breath havin', wine-guzzlin', funny-tawkin' spaghetti bendin' far up north Y*nkee.

And I mean that in the best possible way.

ndspinelli said...

Thanks, Sixty. I was afraid of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. I actually watched that remake w/ Donald Sutherland a few weeks ago. I saw it in the theatre years back. It was pretty good.

ndspinelli said...

Sixty, Were those folks having sex in a work shed display @ the Charleston Home Depot family or just friends.

The Dude said...

In all seriousness, Nick, that story about your great-grandfather and your grandfather is a true family heirloom. Treasure it, pass it on.

When I first got seriously interested in opera I used to talk to a coworker about various composers and performers. This guy was so serious he had joined the SF opera troupe just to be closer to the action - he would appear on stage as an extra, that sort of thing.

Anyway, after his time in Viet Nam he was stationed in Germany and once took leave time to drive down to Milan, specifically to go to La Scala - was truly a pilgrimage for him.

Having the opportunity to see an opera at La Scala is about the only reason I would get travel again. It is truly the place to go.

The Paris Opera is a place I have been to - walked in just before Easter in '96, saw that the scheduled opera was one I hadn't seen, so I sauntered over to the ticket window - say, there, miss, do ya have a ticket you could spare?

Oui monsieur. Only thing is, the Paris Opera House was closed for renovation and the opera was being staged out at the Bastille Opera house. No thanks - I remember when that place was a jail. Okay, I don't actually remember, and it is not the same building, but we are talkin' about the Paris Opera House here - I am not walkin' across town to see a show in some modern building. No way, Jose.

So I walked back to my hotel room. So it goes in the big city...

The Dude said...

As for the shed people, as I understand it they are now going to get a divorce, but they will always be brother and sister.

ricpic said...

My Dad got fleas in the Paris Opera. This was in late '44. First you get fleas then they send you off to The Bulge. What a deal!

The Dude said...

Glad he made it back - that was a terrible battle.

rhhardin said...

Candide.

The Dude said...

Bernstein - that ol' boy could slap some notes together that's for sure.

I'll see your Lenny and raise you a John Adams.

The Dude said...

Kathleen Kim inhabits this role a bit too well for my comfort.

The Dude said...

One of my favorites.

Who doesn't like Chinese ballerinas carrying wooden rifles, am I right?

The solo dancer somehow captures my imagination despite not being Irish. She dances effortlessly and with such great expression.

To think that a commie from California was able to write an opera about commies that somehow show that commies are brutal killers. The irony, it burns!

The Dude said...

CHORUS
Flesh rebels
the body pulls
those inflamed soul
that mark its trials
into the war.
Arm this soldier!
Rise up in arms!
Tropical storms
uproot the palms
ending their sway.
The Red Army
showed us the way.
From the scorched earth
people step forth
over dead wood
and over the dead.
Follow their lead.
The hand grenade
beats in the chest;
let the heart burst,
let the clenched first
strike the first blow
for Chairman Mao
and overthrow
the tyrant, and
share out the land.
Share out the land,
unclench the first,
let the heart burst
and sow broadcast
the dragon’s teeth
your kin and kith
seed of your seed
your flesh and blood.

Because communism is always such a laff riot!

TTBurnett said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
TTBurnett said...

Back to our Figaro aria: The video is of a 1966 performance at the Salzburg Festival under the legendary Karl Bohm. Claire Watson and Reni Grist's voices are lovely, although Watson has some minor trouble at the beginning. The thing that is notable about this performance is the slow tempo and the absolute warmth and attention to affective detail Bohm brings to it. It takes really good singers to pull this off so slowly, and the whole ensemble, vocal and instrumental, is just beautiful. Listening to that old-fashioned Mitteleuropäscher woodwind section, the orchestra's detail of phrasing, and the subtle overall sense of intonation, raises a lump in my throat. Karl Bohm was famous for presiding over such performances in his long career. He was a master of combining warmth, intellect, precision, and sheer beauty in everything he did.


Whether such beauty is quite what is called for here, or whether Mozart would have as happy with it, are questions that might seem churlish in the afterglow of this performance. So, instead of addressing them directly, I'll just link to another performance from a few years ago.


This is a British effort, conducted by John Eliot Gardiner, noted for his early music work, and the performers are from the Monteverdi Choir in London. The Countess and Susanna are not well-known opera stars, but, as you can hear, are quite as good as they ought to be. The orchestra no doubt consists of the Usual English Early Music Suspects, playing on instruments that would have been familiar to Mozart. The pitch is a bit lower, as befits Ye Olde Instruments of Musick. The costumes and set are also a bit more basic, as befits modern pinched budgets. I like the age and voice differences between the Countess and Susanna, who, surprisingly for opera, are well-cast.


This performance is historically informed. The work of generations of Musicologists went into everything about it. In theory, it should resemble what Mozart might have heard and had in mind.



Because cultural memories in Continental Europe have been deep and long—treasured perhaps all the more in the aftermath of the first half of the 20th century—the differences of 180 years are not so great as you might expect. On one hand, there was a living tradition looking back through the haze of unbroken history. And, on the other, we have a "museum quality" reconstruction by a fresh, younger generation with a new take on it all.


I'm not telling you which to like, as I am not sure myself. I am moved almost to tears by Bohm and everything he represents. And my Boomer rebellious heart leaps at a fresh way, intellectually rigorous and cleared of the encrustations of a decrepit culture. My fear is that this second performance is another piece of decadence, just in time for the wholesale abandonment of the original decrepitude, reconstructed or not.

The Dude said...

Great link, Tim - that is a marvelous performance, and as always, your depth and breadth of knowledge is impressive.

The two singers work well together and both of them act their roles very nicely. Did they break the 4th wall there at the end - what a nice touch!

Folks, whatever knowledge I might have gained over the years, know that Tim has forgotten more about music than I have ever learned. He is the kind of guy I am talking about - in order to learn, hang out with the Timster or someone like Tim - someone who knows stuff and can clearly articulate and transfer information to others. A teacher, in other words.

deborah said...

Thank you for the Orfeo, rh. I shall order the DVD.

20 lashes with an al dente noodle for the Candide. This is a serious thread and your smart ass contributions are not looked upon favorably.

All: please consider book-marking this page. I will be going through everybody's links, mulling, going off on rabbit chases through youtube, etc. <3 <---- that's a heart.

deborah said...

Sixty,

re the harshness of the German language, I'm surprised you didn't weigh in on Ritmo's erudite rant:

I'll never know why Germanophiles can't understand why the language sounds so ugly to almost everyone else.

Here's why:

1. It's a language of technical abstraction to the extreme. Yes, it has a scientific legacy which might be sexy to geek-lovers, but the fact that it strings endless series of word particles together to make umpteen-syllable compound words detracts from the very simplicity that is beauty. It's like saying you find the ones and zeros of binary code prettier than a digital image.

2. It's made fricatives out of every plosive. To a non-linguist, that might not sound like a very damning charge, but imagine an English speaker who forcibly over-annunciated every 't' to the point of turning it into a spitting 's', and every 'p' to the point of becoming a bunch of 'ffffff's. Or a bunch of 'pfffff's, is more like it (which is incidentally how we transcribe the blowing of fart noises by vibrating one's tongue between the lips. Not sexy? You're right). That speaker is now well on his way to becoming German, as far as phonology is concerned.

So yeah, if anal-retentive precision in your sentence structure and coercive over-annunciation of hard consonants to the point where they implode into spitting sounds is your bag, then I guess that's a sexy language.


I adore Damrau's enunciation and power.

Re Gilda, lol thanks. I see she is a great actress as well as diva.

Re La Boheme, I definitely need to consult Wiki :)

Thanks for the tips.

deborah said...

lol CS, well played.

deborah said...

Nick, thanks for sharing your wonderful memories and the Vegas tip. Now I have another reason for wanting to go to Vegas than eventually attending a Trek convention :)

(People who drive self-righteously in the passing lane, because after all, they are doing the speed limit...and I can't kill them.)

deborah said...

Inga, thanks for the Nessun Dorma. Marvelous.

The Dude said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
TTBurnett said...

Thanks, Sixty. I really appreciate that, especially from someone who knows his way around opera (not to mention a large number of other subjects) as well as you do. We also have a lot about woodwork to discuss, but I'm afraid that will have to wait for the appropriate thread ;-)

deborah said...

Tim, thanks for the comparison vid. I trouble over which vid/pic to top my posts with, and here, I was choosing between sound quality, voice, and acting, so I went with the Watson/Grist. They conspire well, with Grist playing the perfect mischievous helper. Yours is beautiful also, of course.