The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: This Saturday the acclaimed German tenor Jonas Kaufmann returns to the Metropolitan Opera in Puccini’s “Girl of the Golden West. It’s the second “Live from The Met in HD” production this season
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By Jacob Stockinger
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This Saturday, Oct. 27, the second production of this season’s “Live From the Met” in HD series will be broadcast worldwide: It is Puccini’s “La Fanciulla del West” (Girl of the Golden West), his last work that, for some reason, has never achieved the popularity of “La Boheme,” “Tosca,” “Madama Butterfly” and “Turandot.”
The production features acclaimed superstar German tenor Jonas Kaufmann (below top), who is returning to the Met stage after four years. Soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek (below bottom) plays the gun-slinging title role.
The hi-definition broadcast of a live performance from the Metropolitan Opera (below) in New York City starts at 11:55 a.m. and runs until 4 p.m. with two intermissions.
The encore showings are next Wednesday, Oct. 31, at 1 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
The opera will be sung in Italian with supertitles in English, German, Spanish and Italian. (You can see the trailer preview in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Tickets are for Saturday broadcasts are $24 for adults and $22 for seniors and children under 13. For encore showings, all tickets are $18.
The cinemas where the opera can be screened are two Marcus Cinemas: the Point Cinema on the west side of Madison (608 833-3980) and the Palace Cinema (608 242-2100) in Sun Prairie.
Here is a link to the Marcus website for addresses and more information. You can also use them to purchase tickets:
http://www.marcustheatres.com/movies/met-aida-live
Here is a link to the Metropolitan Opera’s web site where you can find the titles, dates, casts, production information and video clips of all 10 productions this season, which includes operas by Bizet, Wagner, Donizetti, Saint-Saens, Puccini, Cilea and Poulenc plus a new work, “Marnie,” by Nico Muhly:
https://www.metopera.org/season/in-cinemas/
Here is a review from The New York Times, which right now has a technical glitch that makes loading it difficult (the Times said the problem should be fixed soon):
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/18/arts/music/review-jonas-kaufmann-met-opera-puccini-fanciulla.html
And here is a more positive review from Opera Wire:
http://operawire.com/metropolitan-opera-2018-19-review-la-fanciulla-del-west-jonas-kaufmann-edition/
Here is a link to a synopsis and cast list:
Here is a link to other information about the production of “Girl of the Golden West,” including photos and audiovisual clips:
https://www.metopera.org/season/2018-19-season/la-fanciulla-del-west/
And here is a Wikipedia history of the broadcast series that gives you more information about how many cinemas it uses, the size of the worldwide audience – now including Russia, China and Israel — and how much money it makes for The Met.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Opera_Live_in_HD
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Classical music: What music would you play to honor and mourn the dead, wounded and traumatized victims of the gay night club shooting in Orlando, Florida?
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By Jacob Stockinger
It has been a week now.
A very long, hard and emotional week.
The Ear has heard some classical music dedicated to the victims — 49 killed, some 50 wounded and countless traumatized — of the mass shooting at Pulse, a gay night club in Orlando, Florida, that took place one week ago. (Below is a vigil in support of the LGBT community.)
Others might choose a standard like the famous “Adagio for Strings” by Samuel Barber. It is undeniably moving and perfectly appropriate.
But so far the piece that most moved The Ear, unexpectedly, was a familiar one that aired on Wisconsin Public Radio: the “Nimrod” variation from the “Enigma Variations” by Sir Edward Elgar.
The Ear hears tenderness, gentleness and even love in the music. But in it he also hears strength, resilience and pride as well as sorrow, acceptance and resignation.
Plus, he likes the idea of enigma that is attached to it, given all the issues and questions — terrorism, Islamic radicalization and extremism, homophobia, self-hatred, hate crimes, gun control, protests, mass grieving — that still surround the incident and remain to be solved.
You can listen to the piece of music in the YouTube video at the bottom that features conductor Daniel Barenboim conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. It has more than 3 million hits.
But The Ear is also sure that there is a great deal of other music that would suit the purpose. They include:
The passions, oratorios and cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach.
The Requiems of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Johannes Brahms, Giuseppe Verdi and Gabriel Faure.
The symphonies of Ludwig van Beethoven, Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, Peter Tchaikovsky and Antonin Dvorak.
The string quartets, piano trios, duo sonatas and other chamber music by Joseph Haydn and Franz Schubert as well as the solo piano music of Chopin, Schumann and so many others.
The masses of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert.
The songs of Schubert and arias and choruses from all kinds of operas, but especially those of Giacomo Puccini.
And on and on.
Leave your personal choice, with a YouTube link if possible, and your reason for choosing it in the COMMENT section.
The Ear wants to hear.
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