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Jan. 31st, 2004 09:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jaalaI love this guy. I got to see him narrate the plot of Carmen (Bizet) for a concert performance of the opera with the Kingston Symphony yesterday.
Oh yes, most of the rest of the performance was quite enjoyable as well. I've heard many bits and pieces of Carmen before, naturally, but never the whole opera.The music is very charming (lots of fun faux-Spanish touches) if not overly sophisticated in its development. It went over like wildfire with the packed house, of course. The Symphony has promoted the heck out of it because this is the type of programming that brings in the money.
I saw my flute professor at the concert (she's in the Symphony) and intended to speak to her (re: sleeping through my lesson again this Wednesday) but I never found the moment to break into her conversation before she went upstairs to the reception.
* * *
After missing the earlier (on-time) bus at noon, I made it to about half of a fascinating lecture on Falstaff (i.e. its transformation from Shakespeare to Boito/Verdi), the cultural significance of the hunt, and horn calls. This would be the second guest lecture by the same professor who taught Canadian Music last term and is teaching Opera and the Romantic Tradition (a special topic course) this term... yet who is leaving at the end of the year. We were a practice audience; he's presenting the lecture in Toronto today.
We were treated to renditions of several elaborate hunting calls on a period instrument with an incredibly piercing sound. I am sure from his professional credentials for several different period instruments that he is a fantastic player, but that poor man is in the Symphony as well so he's had to switch back and forth between modern horn and an instrument like this on a daily basis. And this is a horn that must be played with embouchure alone; the bell is too small for hand stopping. And he held it as a person riding on horseback would have, held by one hand over the the shoulder (not like this). Nevertheless, the playing was still most impressive. . (I'm not a horn major, so I didn't see the earlier lecture on horn technique which apparently featured many different period instruments. Would have been interesting to see if I hadn't been obliged to go to class instead...)
A fact to file under things I didn't know about the late-17th-century French court:
Hunting horns were slung over the head and right shoulder while not being played. The French court at that time was very concerned with opulence and elegant appearance. One reason a hunting horn with a wider circumference was developed was so that it could fit over the huntsman's large three-cornered hat.
Speaking of opera and Toronto (as I was a couple paragraphs ago): I am quite excited about this. It sure took long enough for an acclaimed opera based on a novel by a Canadian author to come to Canada...
* * *
Once I finally left the theatre after Carmen, I went to Tim Hortons[1] for dinner because I knew it was likely to be only place open after 11pm. Having spent the entire day saying very little to anybody, I felt more and more dejected as I sat there considering (a) how many familiar faces I'd seen at the theatre and (b) that I was still eating dinner alone. I was feeling very low indeed as I walked back to the theatre to call a cab and passed the restaurant next to the theatre where a group of third-year students were dining, but my evening was brightened considerably by a friendly conversation with a street person who was warming himself at the heating vent in the outer lobby. Initially, he thought I was "one of the street people"--interesting, but then again I originally thought he was a security guard. I guess cold weather makes one less observant.
[1] a.k.s. The place that used to have really good donuts but changed them recently so that they haven't a chance in h-ll of competing with the American Krispy Kreme invasion. Oh yeah... they serve coffee too and other food too.
* * *
My sleep patterns are royally screwed up at the moment because I've been getting insomnia for days at a time. Must fix that this weekend. And catch up in the New Testament[2] readings and finish a four-page essay. And practice more. And start on the Don Giovanni paper for Opera class. And vacuum. And...
My cold finally seems to be departing though, so that's good.
[2] Taught, interestingly, by a a very Jewish professor. He goes off on weird rants (the immigrant contribution to U.S. urban renewal when discussing Paul?), but aside from that I like his teaching style so far.
Oh yes, most of the rest of the performance was quite enjoyable as well. I've heard many bits and pieces of Carmen before, naturally, but never the whole opera.The music is very charming (lots of fun faux-Spanish touches) if not overly sophisticated in its development. It went over like wildfire with the packed house, of course. The Symphony has promoted the heck out of it because this is the type of programming that brings in the money.
I saw my flute professor at the concert (she's in the Symphony) and intended to speak to her (re: sleeping through my lesson again this Wednesday) but I never found the moment to break into her conversation before she went upstairs to the reception.
* * *
After missing the earlier (on-time) bus at noon, I made it to about half of a fascinating lecture on Falstaff (i.e. its transformation from Shakespeare to Boito/Verdi), the cultural significance of the hunt, and horn calls. This would be the second guest lecture by the same professor who taught Canadian Music last term and is teaching Opera and the Romantic Tradition (a special topic course) this term... yet who is leaving at the end of the year. We were a practice audience; he's presenting the lecture in Toronto today.
We were treated to renditions of several elaborate hunting calls on a period instrument with an incredibly piercing sound. I am sure from his professional credentials for several different period instruments that he is a fantastic player, but that poor man is in the Symphony as well so he's had to switch back and forth between modern horn and an instrument like this on a daily basis. And this is a horn that must be played with embouchure alone; the bell is too small for hand stopping. And he held it as a person riding on horseback would have, held by one hand over the the shoulder (not like this). Nevertheless, the playing was still most impressive. . (I'm not a horn major, so I didn't see the earlier lecture on horn technique which apparently featured many different period instruments. Would have been interesting to see if I hadn't been obliged to go to class instead...)
A fact to file under things I didn't know about the late-17th-century French court:
Hunting horns were slung over the head and right shoulder while not being played. The French court at that time was very concerned with opulence and elegant appearance. One reason a hunting horn with a wider circumference was developed was so that it could fit over the huntsman's large three-cornered hat.
Speaking of opera and Toronto (as I was a couple paragraphs ago): I am quite excited about this. It sure took long enough for an acclaimed opera based on a novel by a Canadian author to come to Canada...
* * *
Once I finally left the theatre after Carmen, I went to Tim Hortons[1] for dinner because I knew it was likely to be only place open after 11pm. Having spent the entire day saying very little to anybody, I felt more and more dejected as I sat there considering (a) how many familiar faces I'd seen at the theatre and (b) that I was still eating dinner alone. I was feeling very low indeed as I walked back to the theatre to call a cab and passed the restaurant next to the theatre where a group of third-year students were dining, but my evening was brightened considerably by a friendly conversation with a street person who was warming himself at the heating vent in the outer lobby. Initially, he thought I was "one of the street people"--interesting, but then again I originally thought he was a security guard. I guess cold weather makes one less observant.
[1] a.k.s. The place that used to have really good donuts but changed them recently so that they haven't a chance in h-ll of competing with the American Krispy Kreme invasion. Oh yeah... they serve coffee too and other food too.
* * *
My sleep patterns are royally screwed up at the moment because I've been getting insomnia for days at a time. Must fix that this weekend. And catch up in the New Testament[2] readings and finish a four-page essay. And practice more. And start on the Don Giovanni paper for Opera class. And vacuum. And...
My cold finally seems to be departing though, so that's good.
[2] Taught, interestingly, by a a very Jewish professor. He goes off on weird rants (the immigrant contribution to U.S. urban renewal when discussing Paul?), but aside from that I like his teaching style so far.
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no subject
Date: 2004-01-31 10:18 am (UTC)Yay for very Jewish professors!
BTW, I found that horn... gorn.
Or, more appropriately, "Gone away, gone away, was it one of them took it away?"
Date: 2004-01-31 01:15 pm (UTC)If Stuart Hamilton has coached here (as opposed to at Mount Allison, which I obviously couldn't attend) I didn't hear about it... but then again, I don't usually tend to hear about vocal studio stuff. I heard someone "weird" was filling in for the head of the vocal department (who is singing Escamillo) but Stuart Hamilton is a star in Kingston and on the CBC so I suspect I would have heard about that.
I have heard the man on "Saturday Afternoon at the Opera" ever since I was a child. My friend Imogen from first year was a contestant on the university edition of the Opera Quiz (his segment) and I regret to this day that I missed hearing them toss witticisms at each other.
I've seen him in person once before, providing a pre-show lecture for Quasthoff's Toronto recital a couple years back. On that particular occasion, he was wearing shiny jodhpurs, a turtleneck and a suit jacket! His leather trousers are legendary. (There's a photo of him here with Harley T-shirt, but nothing below the waist is in view.)
Bruce (the professor singing Escamillo) is a delightful character himself. Even though it was a concert performance, he got really into the acting, swaggering and womanizing as appropriate.
I once witnessed a scene in which us students sitting in the lounge down the hall could hear him singing for his whole trip to and from the bathroom. "Hey, Bruce!" says one girl, "were you just singing in the bathroom?" He proclaims, "Of course! I always sing when I pee! It helps things [dramatically resonant] come out!" Students call after him in the hallways asking for extra lessons. Man, I wish I was a voice student...
Nice new userpics, btw. Perhaps you might consider one of these some time.
Re: Or, more appropriately, "Gone away, gone away, was it one of them took it away?"
Date: 2004-01-31 02:10 pm (UTC)I really like the third of the pics you pointed me at. Very... decadent. I blame, er, probably Dave I think.