Tenors

I'm very excited about these new tenors. I haven't been really excited over a tenor since Domingo in Girl of the Golden West, and that wasn't exactly a musical excitement.

We have not had a truly wild tenor since Corelli and Mario del Monaco, and now there is Licitra. A gap has been filled. Since this Trovatore video he has lost weight and gotten rid of several pounds of hair. I rather liked his furry persona--it reminds me of my son when he was younger--though I realize it may be costume. Licitra is a spinto.

The best of the videos I bought from House of Opera is the La Boheme with Rolando Villazon. I can definitely recommend it. He has a dark lyric voice and is handsome and pleasant looking. He is very polished musically and uses his body well. He and his Mimi (Alexia Voulgaridou) are more beautiful than any of Baz Luhrmann's La Boheme people. The performance seems to be taking place outdoors on a barge somewhere in Germany. Since it is outdoors, they are wearing microphones in the Madonna configuration. Miking outdoor performances is definitely a good thing. It is well photographed and recorded, and the performance, while not quite as awesome as Bjoerling and de los Angeles, is still very nice indeed.

It is easy to imagine this handsome man with the dark voice paired with similarly dark voiced and beautiful Anna, but it would not be La Boheme--she insists on singing Musetta and not Mimi. She likes the idea of men at her feet.

And we have Florez for Rossini and Heppner for Wagner. Our cup truly runneth over.