What opera have you been listening to, lately?

**Florestan** · June 8th, 2017, 04:59 PM

Originally Posted by Festat

The day has come! Florestan listening to countertenors! And enjoying it!

It worked because in the DVD with Janet Baker, David Bowman plays Tolomeo wonderfully. Tolomeo is a creep and the countertenor voice just adds to the creepiness of it. But you have a point. Once the countertenor camel gets his nose in the tent, the rest of the camel is soon to follow. I still try to avoid them for the most part, and certainly would not buy an aria set, but one has to live with them if one is to thoroughly explore Baroque opera. I generally like it better when the counter tenor dies in the opera.

**Florestan** · June 9th, 2017, 01:55 AM

**Soave_Fanciulla** · June 9th, 2017, 07:58 AM

Originally Posted by Florestan

I will explore your recommendations. I have only watched the sunt-in-English one with Janet Baker and loved it. In fact, I ordered the soundtrack to that too. I cannot find a better rendition of "Da tempeste" than Valerie Masterson in the sung-in-English set:

This is a cool production but severely cut.

**Soave_Fanciulla** · June 9th, 2017, 08:00 AM

Originally Posted by Florestan

It worked because in the DVD with Janet Baker, David Bowman plays Tolomeo wonderfully. Tolomeo is a creep and the countertenor voice just adds to the creepiness of it.

Wait till you see Christophe Dumaux as a snakily sexy but thoroughly odious Tolomeo in the Glyndebourne production!

**Florestan** · June 9th, 2017, 11:45 AM

Originally Posted by Soave_Fanciulla

This is a cool production but severely cut.

Yes, it is around 3 hours and I think the CD set I just got (Jacobs) is closer to 4 hours. But my Sills Julius Caesar is only around 2 hours!

Originally Posted by Soave_Fanciulla

Wait till you see Christophe Dumaux as a snakily sexy but thoroughly odious Tolomeo in the Glyndebourne production!

I'll have to check it out on You Tube.

**Festat** · June 9th, 2017, 03:06 PM

Overall very good, as expected, but let's talk about that second act finale... It is a freaking ANDANTE! Why would you cramp up one of the nicest Handel duets in 4 minutes, for God's sake? There are so few of them! Robert King does the same on the Hyperion set and I find it just... incomprehensible. I'm not usually one to complain about tempi but it makes it sounds like music to jog to. That's something that I think the ~last generation~ of Handel conductors (Curtis, McGegan, Kraemer, Christie) knew how to handle much better than the current one. McGegan's 6-minute Notte cara is much more like it, I guess:

**Sonata** · June 9th, 2017, 08:17 PM

Lohengrin-Kempe

**Dichteurehalle** · June 9th, 2017, 10:21 PM

Originally Posted by Sonata

Lohengrin-Kempe

Earlier this week, I was at a bar with some other opera fans, and we were talking about Salome. An older Australian man came over and introduced himself as a former opera singer. Apparently he had trained with DFD(!), though it sounded like he hadn't really been a huge fan ("sang some roles that didn't suit him and a TERRIBLE teacher, but so good at lied").