We left at the interval...

ONP Bastille, Tuesday November 29 2011 Conductor: Philippe Jordan. Production: Jean-Claude Auvray. Sets: Alain Chambon. Costumes; Maria-Chiara Donato. Lighting: Laurent Castaingt. Il Marchese di Calatrava: Mario Luperi. Donna Leonora: Violeta Urmana. Don Carlo di Vargas: Vladimir Stoyanov. Don Alvaro: Marcelo Alvarez. Preziosilla: Nadia Krasteva. Padre Guardiano: Kwangchul Youn. Fra Melitone: Nicola Alaimo. Orchestra and Chorus of the Opéra National De Paris. I don’t always read the reviews before going along to the opera, but this time I did and found them ominously full of faint praise. “Inoffensive” production (in these uncertain times in Paris, that’s seen as a good thing). “Well-made costumes… secondary roles well sung…” In the event, the production wasn’t so much inoffensive as inexistent; and while Alvarez was off sick on the first night, he was there yesterday, more of which later. I suppose quoting yourself isn’t done, a good enough reason to do it. You may remember tha...

La Monnaie, Sunday June 8 2008 Conductor: Kazushi Ono. Production: Dirk Tanghe. Sets & Costumes: Richard Hudson. Il marchese di Calatrava: Alessandro Guerzoni. Donna Leonora di Vargas: Eva-Maria Westbroek. Don Carlo di Vargas: Vassily Gerello. Don Alvaro: Zoran Todorovich. Preziosilla: Marianne Cornetti. Padre Guardiano: Carlo Colombara. Fra Melitone: José van Dam. What the Fach? "For some time now La Forza has been my partner, my lover, my mistress, my girlfriend, my hope, my consolation, my angel. She is also the sister of my sorrows, of my bottomless solitude, of my blackest and most destructive depressions, of my melancholy (that damned melancholy that exhausts me so), of my millions of existential questions, who was I, who am I, what did I want yesterday, what do I want today..." There are three pages of this stuff in the programme, leading me to wonder if stage director Dirk Tanghe spent all his energy on writing it and so had none left for his production, which wa...