"My Lord, Listen!"*
Last night, I saw Turandot at the Met. I'm a little sad to report, it was a mixed experience.
The music was lovely, which was to be expected, as Turandot is a beautiful piece with lots of recognizable music. It's a shame Puccini died before he could finish it; I wonder how he would've ended the piece.
Anyhow, going back to the recognizable bits, because Turandot is so often used in other things, I spent much of the night thinking about ice skating and Bend it Like Beckham. Puccini also used some traditional Chinese folk songs in his opera, the most prominent being Jasmine Flower. So, every time the music descended into its melody, instead of listening to the Italian lyrics Puccini paired with the music, my brain started to sing: Hao yī duo měilì de mò li hua . . .. Not surprisingly, it's stuck in my head today.
But just because I was focused on the Chinese folksongs doesn't mean I wasn't listening to the actual opera. :P Calaf's, Nessum Dorma, one of the opera's most famous arias, was performed quite nicely, although it transitioned to the next piece in a very funny way. It was abrupt and garbled. Having never heard the opera in full before, I don't know if that's a fault of the composition itself or the orchestra's performance last night. Turandot's, In Questa Reggia, was also performed adequately. But the stand-out was, hands down, Liù's, Signore, Ascolta.* I had shivers running down my spine. (She was, btw, the same soprano who performed Violetta the night I saw La Traviata.)
Now that I've covered the good . . . the bad is I couldn't see half the stage! I'm not going to lie. Much of the reason why I was looking forward to Turandot was because of its set. Like La Traviata & Cav/Pag, this was also a Zeffirelli production, so it promised to be lavish and extravagant. Indeed, the tiny picture on the Met's website reinforced that image. As did the postcard I saw of one of its stages. (adventurat, hope you don't me linking to your Flikr page.) I mean, just look at it!
(My LJ layout tends to cut pics in half. To see the full-size pic, click here.)
But all that doesn't matter when you can't see half the stage!
I was in the top row, off to the side. I don't know if it would've mattered even if I'd been in the top row, but in the center of the house. The problem was, being that high up, the top of the stage cut off one's view of the back of the stage. Thus, I never saw the Emperor or his gorgeous throne as he was performing somewhere upstage. And the bridges and fake water, while very pretty, was not as impressive as I'd envisioned them. Looking at the pictures online once more, I now know why they weren't all that impressive last night. It's not because I'd recollected incorrectly, it's because I never got to see the whole stage!
Still, I can't complain too much. What I did see of the set was very cool (lion dance, Chinese acrobats, Chinese dancing, oh my!). Not to mention, they built a freakin' Chinese village for the first act. (Although, again, because I couldn't see upstage I missed Calaf sighting Turandot for the first time. *headdesk*)
I kind of wish I had the fortitude to go see it again, try for the rush orchestra tickets just so I could see the full stage because I know it would then live up to my expectations. But then I'd have to sit through it for another three hours and . . . oy. It's not the opera. The opera itself is only 1.5 hours and quite delightful to listen to. It's the the other 1.5 hours worth of intermissions that kill.
*sigh*
The music was lovely, which was to be expected, as Turandot is a beautiful piece with lots of recognizable music. It's a shame Puccini died before he could finish it; I wonder how he would've ended the piece.
Anyhow, going back to the recognizable bits, because Turandot is so often used in other things, I spent much of the night thinking about ice skating and Bend it Like Beckham. Puccini also used some traditional Chinese folk songs in his opera, the most prominent being Jasmine Flower. So, every time the music descended into its melody, instead of listening to the Italian lyrics Puccini paired with the music, my brain started to sing: Hao yī duo měilì de mò li hua . . .. Not surprisingly, it's stuck in my head today.
But just because I was focused on the Chinese folksongs doesn't mean I wasn't listening to the actual opera. :P Calaf's, Nessum Dorma, one of the opera's most famous arias, was performed quite nicely, although it transitioned to the next piece in a very funny way. It was abrupt and garbled. Having never heard the opera in full before, I don't know if that's a fault of the composition itself or the orchestra's performance last night. Turandot's, In Questa Reggia, was also performed adequately. But the stand-out was, hands down, Liù's, Signore, Ascolta.* I had shivers running down my spine. (She was, btw, the same soprano who performed Violetta the night I saw La Traviata.)
Now that I've covered the good . . . the bad is I couldn't see half the stage! I'm not going to lie. Much of the reason why I was looking forward to Turandot was because of its set. Like La Traviata & Cav/Pag, this was also a Zeffirelli production, so it promised to be lavish and extravagant. Indeed, the tiny picture on the Met's website reinforced that image. As did the postcard I saw of one of its stages. (adventurat, hope you don't me linking to your Flikr page.) I mean, just look at it!
(My LJ layout tends to cut pics in half. To see the full-size pic, click here.)
But all that doesn't matter when you can't see half the stage!
I was in the top row, off to the side. I don't know if it would've mattered even if I'd been in the top row, but in the center of the house. The problem was, being that high up, the top of the stage cut off one's view of the back of the stage. Thus, I never saw the Emperor or his gorgeous throne as he was performing somewhere upstage. And the bridges and fake water, while very pretty, was not as impressive as I'd envisioned them. Looking at the pictures online once more, I now know why they weren't all that impressive last night. It's not because I'd recollected incorrectly, it's because I never got to see the whole stage!
Still, I can't complain too much. What I did see of the set was very cool (lion dance, Chinese acrobats, Chinese dancing, oh my!). Not to mention, they built a freakin' Chinese village for the first act. (Although, again, because I couldn't see upstage I missed Calaf sighting Turandot for the first time. *headdesk*)
I kind of wish I had the fortitude to go see it again, try for the rush orchestra tickets just so I could see the full stage because I know it would then live up to my expectations. But then I'd have to sit through it for another three hours and . . . oy. It's not the opera. The opera itself is only 1.5 hours and quite delightful to listen to. It's the the other 1.5 hours worth of intermissions that kill.
*sigh*