Oberon's Grove

Verdi REQUIEM ~ San Francisco 1973

Seiji Ozawa leads the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in a 1973 performance of the Verdi REQUIEM with soloists Martina Arroyo (photo), Maureen Forrester, Placido Domingo, and Martti Talvela.

Listen here.

Eight Cellists Play Villa-Lobos

Eight celebrated cellists join in a performance of Heitor Villa-Lobos' Bachianas Brasileiras nr. 1 during the time of the pandemic.

Watch and listen here.

The cellists are:

Alban Gerhardt
Johannes Moser
Pablo Ferrandez
Julia Hagen
Camille Thomas
Alisa Weilerstein-Payare
Gautier Capuçon
Kian Soltani

Francis Poulenc's STABAT MATER

The Monteverdi Choir, with soloist Christine Wolff, perform Francis Poulenc's STABAT MATER, conducted by Matthias Beckert, at a 2012 concert at the Neubaukirche in Würzburg, Germany.

Watch and listen here.

This work is new to me, and I love it!

Discoveries VIII

Things I found by chance on YouTube during the pandemic:

Alan Titus sings the Prologo from Leoncavallo's PAGLIACCI at a concert given at The Bolshoi in 1989.

Watch and listen here.

Elisabeth Steiner sings Berlioz's "Au cimetiére" from Les Nuits d´été, from a 1977 concert conducted by Aldo Ceccato.

Watch and listed here.

Jerome Hines sings Zaccaria's "Sperate, o figli!" from Verdi's NABUCCO in a 1961 Met Opera performance. Listen here.

Ortrun Wenkel sings the Agnus Dei (with Lou Ann Wyckoff, above) and the Lux aeterna (with John Mitchinson and Günter Reich) from an undated performance of the Verdi REQUIEM given at the St. Vituskirche in Hilversum, Netherlands.

The Radio Filharmonisch Orkest and the Het Groot Omroepkoor are conducted by Jean Fournet.

Watch and listen here.

Sesto Bruscantini is Simon (above) and Josella Ligi is Amelia in the great father-daughter duet from the 1857 version of Verdi's SIMON BOCCANEGRA. The BBC Concert Orchestra is conducted by John Matheson in this 1975 from the Golders Green Hippodrome. Listen here.

Katia Ricciarelli singing the Canzone di Doretta from Puccini's LA RONDINE at a 1976 recital; Joan Dornemann is the pianist.

Watch and listen here.

The great Canadian baritone Louis Quilico sings Michele's great aria "Nulla, Silenzio!" from Puccini's IL TABARRO from a televised performance in the 1960s.

Watch and listen here.

55 Years Ago ~ TURANDOT @ The Met

On September 26th, 1966, I attended my first opera at the New Met: a performance of Puccini's TURANDOT starring Birgit Nilsson (above), Franco Corelli, Teresa Stratas, and Bonaldo Giaiotti, conducted by Zubin Mehta.

A few weeks earlier, I had taken an over-night bus from Syracuse to New York City and joined the ticket line for the opening performances at the new opera house. Read about my adventure here.

I had seen the Met's Cecil Beaton production of TURANDOT previously, at the Old Met. It was considered quite lavish at the time, but within a couple decades it was wildly surpassed by the elaborate Franco Zeffirelli setting. Birgit and Franco seemed thoroughly at home on the Beaton sets, their by-play with Turandot's all-day-lollipop/sceptre, was always commented upon by the fans, who gauged the scene to determine how well the two superstars were getting along on a given evening.

My diary entry was very brief:

"First performance at the New Met!! Magnificent evening, dazzling experience. After hearing Nilsson and Corelli on Saturday matinee broadcasts, it was electrifying to hear them "live"; you can't really tell how immense and thrilling their voices are over the radio. They are great stars!

Teresa Stratas was excellent as Liu, and my favorite bass, Bonaldo Giaiotti, sounded great. Uppman, Nagy, Anthony, and Goodloe - all singers know from the broadcasts - were fine. Mehta tremendous!

There was huge applause after each act, and many curtain calls. The Corelli fans in particular went crazy."

After the ovation finally ceased, I went to the stage door where a huge crowd of people were waiting to meet the artists. They finally came out, and they were all very nice to me. Stratas signed my program, and Birgit signed the photo at the top of this article.

I'd brought along the above photo of Corelli as Radames for him to sign; he seemed genuinely pleased to see this picture of himself, and the fans gathered around him were gasping, "Where did you find this???" 

I remember that I slept very little after getting back to The Henry Hudson Hotel that night. I was really wound-up: I had been going to the opera sporadically since 1962 - plus catching every Met broadcast and building a big record collection. But this evening marked the start of the next phase of my operatic career. I began coming down to New York for long weekends, taking the over-night bus from Syracuse and staying at the Henry Hudson; opera was everything to me.

After spending the Summer of 1974 on Cape Cod with TJ, working for a small ballet company, I moved into his dorm room at Sarah Lawrence College where we spent the 1974-1975 academic year together. We went down to the opera (and also the ballet!) constantly, taking a bus from Bronxville to the A train station at 207th Street - the station that's now a block from where I live.

After he graduated, we moved to Hartford; we were poor, and trips to New York City were few and far between. But after we broke up, I got my own place place and began spending frequent long weekends in NYC again. My promiscuous phase - can 25 years be considered a phase? - started at this point.

Finally, in 1998, shortly before my 50th birthday, I moved to New York City. This had been my plan since that first solo excursion to join the Met ticket line in late Summer 1966, but Hartford had been a 22-year detour.

Now, at last, I was home.

~ Oberon

Okka von der Damerau ~ Kindertotenlieder

Okka von der Damerau sings Mahler's Kindertotenlieder with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, conducted by Eliahu Inbal, from a 2019 concert.

Watch and listen here.

AIDA @ The Arena di Verona ~ 1999

Above: Larissa Diadkova

A performance of Verdi's AIDA given at the Arena di Verona in 1999.

Watch and listen here.

CAST:

Aida: Sylvie Valayre
Radames: José Cura
Amneris: Larissa Diadkova
Amonasro: Leo Nucci
Ramfis: Andrea Papi
Il Re: Carlo Striuli
Sacerdotessa: Antonella Trevisan
Messaggero: Aldo Orsolino

Conductor: Daniel Oren
Staging: Pier Luigi Pizzi

Alfreda Hodgson

The English contralto Alfreda Hodgson studied at the Northern School of Music in Manchester. She was mainly known as a concert artist, performing such works as Mahler's 2nd and 8th symphonies, Lied von der Erde, and Das Knaben Wunderhorn; Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, The Kingdom, and The Apostles; Schoenberg's Gurrelieder, the Beethoven 9th, Mendelssohn's Elijah, Mozart's Requiem, Britten's Spring Symphony, and works by Monteverdi, Bach, and Handel. Her operatic roles included Ulrica and Orfeo.

Known for interpretive gifts, Ms. Hodgson worked with such renowned conductors as Klemperer, Giulini, Maazel, Haitink, Ozawa, Rattle, Abbado, Sir Colin Davis, and Zubin Mehta. Her career flourished in Britain, the USA, and Israel.

Alfreda Hodgson passed away in 1992 at the early age of 52.

Ms. Hodgson sings Brahms' Alto Rhapsody, conducted by Bernard Haitink, here.

From one of the few operatic roles Alfreda Hodgson recorded complete:

Alfreda Hodgson - Voce di donna ~ GIOCONDA - w Caballe-Baltsa-Pavarotti-Milnes-Ghiaurov

PARSIFAL ~ Act II

A concert performance of Act II of Wagner's PARSIFAL given in 2010 by the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jaap van Zweden (photo). Klaus Florian Vogt is Parsifal, Katarina Dalayman is Kundry, and Krister St.Hill is Klingsor.

Watch and listen here.

Verdi REQUIEM @ Baalbeck International Festival

Above: basso John Relyea

A performance of the Verdi REQUIEM from the 2019 Baalbeck International Festival 2019. given at the Bacchus Temple on July 26th, 2019. The soloists are Maria Agresta, Daniela Barcellona, Giorgio Berrugi, and John Relyea, with the Romanian Radio Chamber Orchestra and the Antonine University Choir conducted by Toufic Maatouk.

Watch and listen here.