Ballet, Bailey's, Paris and David

[dianora]

Since the last time I updated, things in Italy have been going much better. I went to the ballet on Thursday night in the Boboli gardens (a Medici legacy in Florence among many others), where they were performing Serenade, one of my long-time favorites, and The Rite of Spring, which I had never seen before. Needless to say, the two acts were as

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[lilac_bearry]

After the ballet I went to a bar on the Arno, right by the Ponte Vecchio

*sings*

Si, si ci voglio andare!
E se l'ami indarno, andrei sul Ponte Vecchio,
ma per armi in Arno!

*sighs*

You know O Mio Babbino Caro, right? I hope you sang it while on Ponte Vecchio. :D

[lilac_bearry]

Ooops, Bambino, not the other. I got the lyrics off a website that I now realize might not have been very reliable. :blush:

[dianora]

Wait, apparently it is babbino, the diminutive of "daddy" -- according to this website, anyway. I always thought it was bambino, too!

To answer your question, I know the song but not well enough to know the lyrics. I never knew the Ponte Vecchio was in it! That's awesome.

Sì, sì, ci voglio andare!
e se l'amassi indarno,
andrei sul Ponte Vecchio,
ma per buttarmi in Arno!

I'll be certain to sing it next time I'm on the Ponte Vecchio, maybe tomorrow. I will not, of course, throw myself (buttarmi) into the Arno. ;)

You have no idea how happy your comment just made me. I actually miss music a lot here, since I didn't bring any CDs, and all you hear on the radio is bad American pop music from a year ago. I should find an opera to go to one of these days (I missed Carmen in the first couple weeks! :O ).

[dianora]

P.S. What makes me especially happy (language geex that I am) is that that little passage alone uses the ci locative, the imperfect subjunctive (amassi), and the conditional (andrei) -- all things I've been learning here! Okay, I'm sad -- I just can't help lovin' those languages. :p

[lilac_bearry]

Oh yes, PLEASE don't do what that girl is singing about! Beautiful song, but a BAD message to send to girls!

IIRC, the rough translation (summarized) is something like "Please, darling father, let me marry him! We'll go down the street to buy a ring, and if you don't let me, I'm gonna die!"

[hymnia]

dafsjl;kafjda;kfd

Oh, yay! I'm glad there's another geeky (I mean that in a good way) music lover around here. When I read this entry earlier today (didn't have time to comment then), O Mio Babbino Caro was the very first thing that popped into my head. I sang it on a recital once--it's such a great song. So shmaltzy. Anyway, that's Puccini--depressing and sometimes inane lyrics, but gorgeous music. It helps if you don't know Italian very well--it makes that song seem like the most profoud thing you ever heard, because you can't tell what a silly sentiment it's expressing. I once heard it sung in English--yuck! Anyway, I will have it stuck in my head for a few days now, I'm sure. I wish I could sing it on the Arno, but alas! I'll just have to live vicariously through Liralen.

[dianora]

Hee. Sang it today near the Ponte Vecchio, not quite on it. Actually I was with an old friend from school who does opera, and he started singing it before I did. You guys are not alone. ;)

[dianora]

Must stop spamming own comments! here's the website I meant to link to.