Thursday, September 25, 2008

Viewing pleasure

Right, you might expect me to be posting about Gioconda, and I guess I may, but...I read a shitload of rehearsed disdain on the intertubes this morning and am feeling oddly averse to entering the conversation just right now. So here are some nice youtube clips. The first is Peter Mattei as Onegin in a pretty-looking modern dress staging. I've expressed my admiration for Hvorostovky's take on the role plenty of times, but Mattei's is certainly the most beautiful voice I've ever heard in the music. Like I actually kind of can't believe how lovely he sounds. Is it too honeysweet for Onegin? Maybe. You tell me.



...and here's another excerpt I find quite thrilling starring Panteleimon (!) Nortzov.



But wait. Did you know there was film footage of Pavel Lisitsian? Because I sure as hell did not.



In fact there's other Lisitsian on youtube, though some of it I can only imagine to be him lip-syncing to recording from when he was younger. I may be wrong, though. Anyway. This Russian loveliness brought to you by my minor fit of pique. (You can just call me the pique dame, if you like.) Later on maybe I'll sound off about how Gioconda, against all expectations, was the best thing Voigt's done in a long time, and of course type in some tedium about Podles.

8 comments:

mostly opera... said...

I actually thought Dmitri Hvorostovsky to be the ideal Eugene Onegin until I saw Peter Mattei in this Salzburg production, which btw. is absolutely stunning. His tone may be honey-sweet, but his characterization is not.

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jondrytay said...

I love Nortsov's Onegin- anyone who doesn't have the classic 1930s recording on Naxos should buy it now. NOW I tell you. And, you're right, Pantaleimon is a hell of a name.

Mattei was a terrific Count Almaviva in the recent Nozze at Covent Garden- for the revival of the McVicar production Mattei and D'Arcangelo replaced Finley and Schrott, and I think we revivalists had the better of the deal. He did look disturbingly like Roger Federer, though, which added all kinds of tennisy nuances to the production.

La Cowntessa said...

Well, I for one am waiting with bated breath for your review. :)

Just consider me your squealing fan girl!

Maury D'annato said...

Mostly Opera: I'm awfully tempted to buy it now.

Maury D'annato said...

american symphony orhcestra: I'm surprised you can all crowd around one keyboard. Hey, so advertising in my comments section? Weirdly inefficient and slightly presumptuous. Drop me an email, however, and I'm almost always glad to post something.

Maury D'annato said...

amerj: I'm trying to remember if it's Nortsov on the set I never listen to because the Tatiana has such a curdled voice...with I think Reizen as Gremin or something?

jondrytay said...

Don't think so- mine is the 1937 Melik-Pashaev recording, with Koslovsky as Lensky and Kruglikova as Tatiana. She's not curdled at all- she's the second best I've heard in the part, I think. I hope I don't need to spell out who the best is.

One Maxim Mikhailov is the Gremin.