Sketching once again...

[almaviva90]

I can't sleep...AGAIN.

So what am I doing now? Well, the title pretty much says it all...as for what or who I'm drawing -- at the moment, I really have no idea.

And who knew that opera could be so funny? If you told me a year ago that opera could be comedic, I would have thought you mad. But I'm proved wrong yet again when one watches operas like Le Nozze di Figaro or Cosi and operettas like Die Fledermaus and Die lustige Witwe.

Here I am trying to sketch and listen to Mozart's Cosi fan tutte at the same time and then I get slightly bored and play my copy of the 1996 MET Cosi with TA, Mentzer, Vaness and Hadley (I'm sorry I can't remember the baritone who played Guglielmo...oops). I get to the scene where the two officers are saying farewell to their lady-loves...and I'm giggling non-stop at the the antics the singers get up to. Guglielmo is overacting his 'despair' at leaving, Hadley's body language (he plays Ferrando) clearly tells Guglielmo to get a move on and isn't too keen to deal with his hyperactive and overemotional fiancee (played wonderfully by Susanne Mentzer; definitely one of the most prettiest Cherubinos, Zerlinas and Dorabellas around. Von Stade obviously gets first place over Mentzer for singing but acting-wise, I simply adore Mentzer who is simply adorable when she gets into character). Vaness as Fiordiligi is trying her best to play older sister but also is frightened at the news of her fiancee going away to war while TA, as usual, plays Don Alfonso with all the sly cynicism and charm. What always makes me laugh is when the two couples are tearfully saying their farewells, he's more interested in pouring the sand out of his shoe (the set does indeed have sand since it's set on a pier/beach) XD

And the Allen/Vaness/Mentzer trio of Soave sia il vento is sublime...so is Francisco Araiza's Un' aura amorosa on my Cosi CD. Sometimes I really prefer Araiza to great tenors like Pavarotti or Domingo for some reason. Domingo was basically the first tenor I listened to (when I bought a highlights CD of  Bizet's Carmen during QBS...we were listening to the darn thing in music lessons for some weird reason) but I wasn't really impressed with a tenor's voice until the first time I saw Araiza sing Dalla sua pace on the 1987 Don Giovanni. I liked Jose van Dam (the Belgian bass-baritone) as Escamillo but again, my mind didn't click with baritone voices till the introduction of a particular British baritone as Count Danilo on Youtube. Really, it's all Jeremy Brett's fault for getting me into opera since it was his singing of the English translations of the songs in Die lustige Witwe that got me looking for other singers singing the same thing. XD

Ah, but I've rambled too long...back to sketching!

Comments

[enserric.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Jeremy Brett, I actually encountered a doujin(err...kinda like fan art story)of Holmes and Watson together....like totally doing it and all. It was awkward since I didn't think people could go that far lol. Creepy I guess heh.

[almaviva90.livejournal.com]

Eek...sometimes I understand slash and all but I find it irritating when people say Holmes and Watson are lovers. Yes, the whole sharing rooms at 221B Baker Street would raise eyebrows today but people seem to forget there *was* a such thing as brotherly love and respect for one another (like the sort of relationships you get between wartime comrades in the trenches, for example).

I wonder what would happen when ppl who think that H/W are lovers watch Gluck's opera, 'Iphiegenie en Tauride' where two friends Oreste and Pylade argue over who gets sacrificed since one of them has to die to placate the gods of the land they have landed upon. They're probably going to have a field day making a mess of the relationship there!

[enserric.livejournal.com]

*laughs* Oh yes they would indeed! And yeah, I miss the days 'brotherly love' could openly be displayed without being scrutinized as homosexuality or just unmanly. *rolls eyes*

[almaviva90.livejournal.com]

Yes...very sad, isn't it? Nowadays, everything that even has the slightest hint of brotherly affection would be unfortunately blown out of proportion these days. =/

Such is the world we live in these days...*sigh*