So as not to completely neglect Luciano Pavarotti on the anniversary of his birth, here he is charming the pants off an audience, with an anecdote about being caught without his. I really miss this guy, one of classical music’s last superstars. Pavarotti died in 2007 at the age of 71.
Pavarotti in “Yes, Giorgio” (1982) – from the director of “Patton!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUSC2MUAp5Y
With all due respect, Pavarotti with goats:
Is Wagner’s music bad for you? Probably.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/may/22/wagner-bad-for-your-mental-health
Happy birthday, Dame Janet Baker!
An appreciation that ran in The Telegraph in 2013:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/opera/10252457/Janet-Baker-a-dame-but-not-a-diva.html
A fascinating interview from earlier this year with Joyce DiDonato:
Baker’s classic recording of Berlioz’s “Les Nuits d’ été with Barbirolli:
Live (performance begins at 10:37):
Elgar’s “Sea Pictures”:
Baker as Purcell’s Dido:
Baker as Berlioz’s Dido (in English!):
“Write what you know” is the frequently dispensed advice to young writers. It could just as easily apply to composers, especially if the composer happens to be Benjamin Britten.
Britten was born in a Suffolk fishing port in 1913. The sights and sounds of the sea were in his blood. Powerful musical evocations of the sea pervade his opera, “Peter Grimes,” which was given its premiere in 1945.
Additionally, the burden of adhering to his principles as a conscientious objector during the war and a lifelong struggle to remain to true to himself as a homosexual in an intolerant world likely informed his sympathetic portrayal of a tortured outsider hounded by an insular coastal community.
Britten’s emotionally complex masterpiece is this year’s opera offering from The Princeton Festival. Performances will take place at McCarter Theatre Center’s Matthews Theatre on Saturday at 8 p.m., June 23 at 7:30 p.m., and June 26 at 3 p.m.
Discounting the popular (though lighter-weight) collaborations of W.S. Gilbert & Sir Arthur Sullivan, “Peter Grimes” was the most successful opera to emerge from England in the 250 years since the death of Henry Purcell in 1695. “Grimes” is worlds away from “H.M.S. Pinafore.”
Read more about the opera and the Princeton Festival’s exciting new production in my interview with stage director Steven LaCosse in today’s Trenton Times:
http://www.nj.com/times-entertainment/index.ssf/2016/06/classical_music_peter_grimes_a.html
Britten’s masterful “Four Sea Interludes” from “Peter Grimes”:
PHOTO: Britten at Aldeburgh, the Suffolk coastal town where he founded his festival of music and the arts in 1948
Does life begin at 90? I don’t know about that, but in today’s classical music world, it’s probably safe to say that 90 is the new 70. Two days after the 90th birthday of composer Carlisle Floyd, whose opera “Prince of Players” was given its premiere by Houston Grand Opera in March, I stumbled across this piece on classical-music.com:
http://www.classical-music.com/article/does-life-begin-90
Curiously the impetus was Queen Elizabeth II, rather than Floyd, whose birthday fell on the very day the article was posted. The composer is conspicuously absent from the list. You can read more about Floyd in my June 11 Facebook entry, which wasn’t ready until Saturday evening and therefore may have escaped your attention.
Sadly, Phyllis Curtin, who created the title role of Floyd’s “Susannah” in 1956, propelling the 29 year-old composer to fame, died on June 5 at the age of 94.
And then there’s this guy:
As Arthur Fiedler always said, “To rest is to rot.”
PHOTO: “Listen, Pappy, you’re 99 years-old. You can’t be going out every night. You got to save your youth for your old age. ”
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