Sin City Carmina Burana

I arrived in coooold Cincinnati to find out that no four star hotel in town had ONE teensy room that hadn't been decked out in plumes and feathers and fluffed up real' good so there was lots of dander in the air for years to come. I will never understand why upscale hotels are so obsessed with luxury that they lose sight that some people are allergic to feathers! It's not enough to come in and cart away the

offending pillows, duvets, etc... if they've already been fluffed a gazillion times and released more dander than a chicken farm into the room! So I ended up at the only place downtown that had *A* room that had never had feather pillows in it. So they tell me. It was fine and the staff nice, but seemed pretty empty. Maybe because they don't have goosedown in every inanimate object? ;-)

Anyhow, we had a fantastic cast for Carmina Burana - Larry Brownlee was (again, as in Tanglewood last summer) a fantastic roasted swan; Stephen Powell was the most character-ful baritone soloist I've ever encountered and had the chops to back it up, and then me. Side note: I haven't seen Stephen in over 10 years (since Glimmerglass Don Pasquale) and it was like we'd just stepped back into each other's lives after 5 minutes. He's great and I've missed him! What a voice, too! He sounds better than I've ever heard him. Go, Stephen!! We played off of one another in the last big ensemble "oh oh oh totus
floreo..." - it was a bit more -ahem- earthy than you usually hear
it. Great stroke of genius from Paavo.. 

We had one audience member comment to us - "Well, here I thought it
was a family show, and then I started reading the supertitles, and
then you two... I wouldn't have brought my granddaughter!" I must add
this was said with a laugh, thank goodness!!

Paavo Järvi was a revelation - - I love how he makes music, I love the
humanity behind what he does and of course, the musicianship is
fantastic! We got along wonderfully, and I hope he will ask for me
again to do some other fun projects. I don't think I've ever sung
Carmina so well in my life! As he conducted, you felt such a
complete sense of mastery and control that you knew he could play with
the music in the concert, not just do it by rote. I think we all felt
that sense of ebb and flow of creativity, and his smiles or jokes with
different players during the concerts only added to that great play
between freedom and control that made both evenings so special. I
told him later myself that it reminded me of one of the most
remarkable traits of the late Richard Hickox - there was a humor and a
joy in making music that is rare to experience and needs to be
cherished when it is found. I hope Paavo can keep that, despite more
and more fame and acclaim.


The orchestra didn't have one weak section - and played beautifully in this HUGE hall.  I think it's the biggest symphonic hall in the U.S.   So-called "regional" orchestras in the U.S. continue to astound me.   Bravo, Cincinnati!

On the first half of the program, the orchestra played Les Nuits d'Été with Measha Brueggersgossman.   She is a force of nature! What a beautiful girl and a beautiful artist.  Listening to her, you realize how many colors and nuances we normally miss in vocal music.  I hope to hear a lot more from her.   And to stay in touch with her - - Measha, write me an email sometime, silly!


After our first concert, we  all went out until 1 or 2 am with Paavo to his favorite Italian restaurant in the main square downtown. We closed down the place.  Luckily, they gave us private room, as we got rather bawdy and loud.   VERY fun!   The next night, there was a party afterwards at a patron's apartment overlooking the whole city. Luckily, he was a FUN patron, and we closed down that party, as well.  Here are Measha and I, teasing Paavo, as well as our lovely patron (can't remember his name, but he had to kick us out with Carol Burnett's "I'm so glad we've had this time together" song at the end of the evening...)



The best part of the evening was that one of my best friends, Roger Roe, came down from Indiana to see the concert and to spend the evening with me! Unfortunately, all I have of him is VIDEO, which doesn't show up on this blog. SOOOOOOOOOOO happy to see you, Roger!!! If I can somehow extract some pictures from the video, I'll add them up here. What a TREAT to get to hang out with Roger and have him be my date! I know Tullio wouldn't mind...