| Zsuzsanna's
Report
Mission Possible: Stand Up Music Show
of José Cura
with the young talents of Virtuosos
in the Tokaj Fesztiválkatlan (Tokaj Festival
Cave), Hungary
28 July
2018
Report
and photos by Zsuzsanna Suba
When I first heard some news about the planned concert of José Cura
in the Tokaj Fesztiválkatlan (Tokaj Festival Cave), that
he would arrive with special musical delights
in which opera would be mixed with popular classics and classics of
the pop and he would also act as a showman during the evening, I couldn’t
imagine what it would mean. He usually used to be a showman and entertain
his audience during his concerts to some extent in other occasions as
well and this event was not the first time when he wanted to perform
pop music. He also declared that this time the attention would be deliberately
concentrated on his invited guests, the young talents of “Virtuosos”,
the young musicians of the classical music talent show developed by
Hungarian
TV (2014-).
I only knew that his participation and contribution would be a guaranty
for excellent entertainment. The concert and the achieved result became
a real curiosity and surprise for the audience gaining huge success
and it was
wearing José Cura’s trademark in many ways.
However the realization of this concert did not come out of nowhere.
In 2015 he was invited to do a joint pop concert by Andrea Mahó and
he managed to fill the Budapest Sport Arena with more than 8000 spectators
in an event where opera wasn’t counted at all. It was a highly successful
trip into a variety of pop classics and musical styles and Cura was
enormously loved by the audience. He met there with Peter Pejtsik, who
conducted the concert and made special arrangements for the musical
pieces which were played by a symphonic orchestra, the Hungarian Studio
Orchestra. It seemed they were at common musical wavelength with each
other sharing musical madness and creative ideas on the stage. Perhaps
both of them have come up with the idea for another joint concert together
in the future where classical and pop music wasn’t separated. Their
ideas were realized now in Tokaj. They managed to find out a genuine
frame and form for the concert as a whole entertaining unit thanks to
its creative and unique construction and realization.
The compiled program and its structure were really original which assumed
a winking, flirting attitude of the audience and the musicians and yes,
it was created well right at the beginning. Thus the concert ensured
high-quality entertainment with a very diverse and beautiful repertoire
from the best sources and it was filled with lovely musical ideas.
It
represented a high range of music from opera to film music, musical,
light pop and hard
rock'n'roll.
The chosen pieces themselves were hits and you’ve never had the chance
to hear them together in such performances and musical sequence as in
this concert. This time the music and its symphonic background (both
for classical, pop and rock) were provided by the Hungarian State Opera
Orchestra conducted by Peter Petjsik (composer, arranger, all-round
musician and performer). As José said: “I met with this amazing musician
three years ago and he surprised me, because he was playing every instrument.
If you give him a potato he plays potato.” The necessary symphonic
arrangements of the pop songs were also provided by Peter Pejtsik. José
Cura and the opera orchestra have known each other for 18 years since
his first, legendary concert in Budapest in 2000. These musicians accompanied
Cura at the second time now in this year after their highly acclaimed
opera concert in Veszprém two weeks earlier. Just imagine how much these
experienced musicians enjoyed, that they were playing a completely different
repertoire and they can show themselves in other musical styles. However,
the gorgeous opera orchestra was supplemented by a rock section, the
“four terrorists” as Cura called them: Gábor, Misi, Adrián, Csabi
at the piano, bass-guitars and drums. Their invited guests were Réka
Koós musical actress-singer and the young musicians of “Virtuosos”:
Luca Bojtos (soprano),
Zoltán Sándor (violin), Dániel Ali Lugosi (clarinet), Csongor Korossy-Khayll
(violin) and Tamás Kökény (double bass). They performed solo
numbers (or duets in the case of the singer), but the young virtuosos
also enriched the sound of the orchestra when they joined to the musicians
with their instruments after their solos for the rest of the concert.
This could be a very exceptional experience for them. They all did their
best to seduce and entertain us with their music and performances.
They achieved huge success with their almost three-hour concert in a
unique, excellent outdoor festival venue of the Tokaj Festival Cave.
Its
fan-shaped, terraced,
huge open-air auditorium was filled with more than 2000 spectators in
front of a giant stage. The whole theatre complex was constructed from
an abandoned mine cave representing a natural theatre. The surrounding
mountain and cliffs, the nearby Bodrog river and the colourful lighting
effects of the stage created a unique atmosphere there. We were not
bored for a minute and we wanted more and more during the long evening.
Besides these, the other unique curiosity of the concert was that this
time being the host of the evening, José Cura entered to a new level
of entertainment as a showman utilizing his genuine sense of humour,
spontaneity and improvisation for the whole evening, from start to the
end. He prepared and produced a Stand Up Music Show on the huge stage.
Not only did he create and perform a brilliant, very high level program
with his partners that embraced different musical genres successfully
but he showed an exemplary solution how to handle this occasion as one
filled with an enormous potential for humour and musical entertainment.
Thus the audience was acquainted and entertained by the classics of
opera and pop music in which the different numbers and performers were
connected together in the frame of a charming one man music show provided
by Cura. I can happily say that we were really good subject for these
purposes. Our
giggles and laughs accompanied the evening from the beginning
and we
constantly waited for the next piece to be conferred.
In addition to this activity José Cura didn’t ignore his role as a singer
and sang a lot during the concert especially in the second half of the
concert and in all the musical genres. Among beautifully performed opera
arias, duets and pop songs, let just mention three real standout numbers.
We witnessed his premiere performance of
"La
donna č mobile",
the belcanto tenor showpiece from Verdi’s Rigoletto. The rock
song of “Proud Mary” represented another Cura debut, this time
as a hard rock singer, where he created a crazy rock-duet with Réka
Koós and improvised the accompaniment of his sturdy voice and rock dance.
The closing Beatles song (“Imagine”) – acted as an encore
- crowned the evening also in an improvised, unique jam session
version with José’s guidance where he not only played with his voice
but he also sounded his guitar and the drums while Peter Pejtsik presented
his musical art on his cello as well.
Starting from the beginning, José Cura grabbed the microphone immediately
as he stepped to the stage and he didn’t drop it for a moment. He constantly
entertained us as a host and compere with his lovely speeches while
he introduced the various elements of the program and his guests to
us.
I don’t have to explain what a pleasure it was to listen to his fluent
and charming storytelling and guidance in the melodious timbre of his
speaking voice. While doing this he was eager to pick up and seize every
opportunity for little jokes.
No need to say he found logical connections among Giacomo Puccini, Ennio
Morricone, Giuseppe Verdi, Hard Rock, Beatles and Bernstein declaring
that there are no barriers among genres when they represent good music.
He brilliantly played with words and stories, handled and solved sudden
situations during their open-air and live performance.
When he didn’t perform on the stage, he stayed nearby in the background.
He was ready to jump on the stage and rescue his colleague with the
right microphone or just watched and enjoyed his partners’ performances
and relax.
He really enjoyed his role as a host and entertainer. They also found
the way how to guide the concert in a fluent and fresh manner with the
help of Zoli who acted as a simultaneous translator together with his
computer. So the computer also played a leading role in the concert.
Nice camera work projected the whole show on the giant screen behind
the stage. Cura’s English commentaries – and also the text of the songs
– also appeared
in Hungarian language
on the right side of the screen
synchronously with Cura’s talk. Thus everybody could easily follow and
understand what was happening on the stage. Of course, Zoli’s excellent
job and the difficulty of Hungarian language were also the sources of
some lovely jokes and spontaneous reflections for José especially when
the audience impatiently demanded Zoli’s really bravura translation
here and there or when Cura checked it with his sixth sense whether
we were in good hands.
Being the host of the show in his conception and realization could be
exhaustive in itself, but moreover he performed on the stage as a singer
in a great part of the concert.
It must be emphasized that José Cura and his partners, all the musicians
and especially our young musical talents did a huge and excellent job
in their different roles. The whole concert acted as an unrestrained
and cheerful music making together with a smiling and receptive audience.
I won’t refer to the audience’s reaction hereafter, because the whole
public was really grateful with their wholehearted and generous applause
when the performers came to the stage or after their productions untiringly
throughout the evening.
The symphonic overture opened the concert from Puccini’s La Fanciulla
del West, and then José Cura ran to the stage with a huge “Jó
estét kivánok!” (“Good Evening!” in Hungarian). He repeated
it with several other languages too while the audience granted him with
a friendly welcoming applause. We were warmed-up with some funny jokes
while he introduced Zoli and the participating musicians to us on the
stage. He referred to Puccini and Fanciulla del West from which
almost every movie music composers had taken ideas. After a short portrayal
of the story of Johnson’s short but intense aria, he started to sing
“Ch’ella mi creda …” beautifully while he also conducted the
orchestra with his hands simultaneously.
Puccini “who wrote a movie in music” was connected to the great
music composer, Mr. Ennio Morricone and spaghetti western and the orchestra
played the haunting melody (“Your love”) from the movie Once
Upon a Time in the West with José’s narration in the beginning (“The
hero is alone on his horse …..” and what a voice he had!). Soon
he handed over the words and the stage to a mesmerizing voice that could
be heard from the distance. For our greatest surprise, a young lady,
Luca Bojtos came to the stage slowly and delighted us with her strong,
caressing soprano and engaging rendition. José recalled that the obligation
of his generation was to prepare the new generation and kindly encouraged
the “treeeembliiiiing” Luca to give us her wonderful voice in
another aria. He couldn’t hide that he felt himself like “Papa”
learning the age of the girl. Though Luca denied it, José almost “killed”
her when she called him as an “old legend” in the rehearsal.
After a short characterization of the duet of Alfredo and Violetta,
they seduced us with a soft, delicate but dynamic duet from Verdi’s
Traviata (“Parigi, o cara”). Then Peter Pejtsik and José
Cura seized the microphone again playing with the words (babbino, babo,
papa, pappino etc.). Thus José claimed and took over the conductor’s
podium from Peter by the right of the grandfather and asked Luca to
sing for him.
Puccini and opera continued and Luca offered her heartfelt solo from
Gianni Schicchi (“O mio babbino caro”).
It was a pleasure to see what a huge potential she own in her voice
and how this young singer was able to transform herself into a confident
and lovely performer during her wonderful solo. She became a real discovery
for us!
After this, José introduced another young talent, Tamás Kökény to us,
who
“plays the double-basses like if it is a violin.”
Tamás won the contest of Virtuosos in 2016 at the age of 16 and his
fingers swung with magical speed and skill on the strings playing Giovanni
Bottesini’s impressive “Tarantella”. It was a brilliant and virtuoso
performance indeed where Tamás’s double-basses solo was playing the
main role in front of the orchestral background creating incredible
dynamic changes and also very lyric, warm and creamy sound. So we agreed
with José when he asked him: “Show me, how many fingers you have?
Four?!” The next number represented the first rock-duet of José
Cura and Réka Koós with
“Eternal flame”. Réka Koós is a well-known and popular musical
actress-singer in Hungary with a comprehensive repertoire from musical
to pop-rock and
José characterized her wild horse/cat temperament and energy expressively
(“Finally I found somebody who is as crazy as me”). Though the
microphones showed their bad behavior in this rock-session, she confirmed
her hot temper well in the ensuing rock song too (“Son of a preacher
man”) while our tenor took a short break.
Then
Dániel Ali Lugossy, who played the clarinet and won the first contest
of the Virtuosos series in 2014, came to the stage. Although he is “almost
20 years old”, he owns a beautiful wife and a kid, and according to
José, “he is another, completely wild young musician like Tamás,
who has 25 fingers”. He gave a wonderfully grace and playful clarinet
solo with the orchestra from Donizetti’s Concertino (2nd movement).
The next duet of Réka Koós and Luca Bojtos followed with a well-known
love song (“Tell Him”). I know well this fine song performed
by Cura’s dark, warm timbre and soft voice too, and this female duet
version in the combination of these two different, strong voices represented
a similar joy to listen to it.
“Stay,
stay here!”
-said José. “This is my revenge!
Two ladies were talking about a man and how to fix a problem. Do you
know how good Giuseppe Verdi answered this female fabulation? Oh, there
is no way to fix it, because
La donna č mobile!
And he started to sing this famous tenor solo from Verdi’s Rigoletto!
Our tenor delineated a lovely rendition of the aria here using a very
soft, lyric voice and expressive body language emphasising both the
playful, dancing pulse and vocal ornamentation of the aria and the very
unstable nature of the female soul. He crowned the solo with his unique,
steely and free, easy high note on the top. He held the closing top
note for really long and nicely checked the elapsed time in his watch.
It was a lovely moment too, when he started his speech in Hungarian
language very intimately: “Megvallok valamit!” (“I confess
something”) and then he continued it in English. “This is the
first time ever in my life I sing “La donna č mobile!”
And it is good fun!”
As the closing number of the first part of the concert, another young
talent, Csongor Korossy-Khayll played his violin solo with the orchestra
(part
of „Introduction et rondo capriccioso” from Saint-Saëns).
This melodious and appealing piece was a very good choice and balm for
our soul. Csongor showed us everything on his instrument and he enchanted
us with his virtuoso, passionate and fluent style.
The second part of the concert started with a riddle.
„Do
you know what is common between Tom Cruise and me?”
– sounded the question from José. We tried to guess it (age, height?).
“I’m 55, he is 56. I’m 185, he is 168. I have a belly, he doesn’t
have a belly. Do you know who wrote the music of Mission Impossible?
Lalo Schifrin, he is Argentinian.” Then the orchestra played the
“Theme from Mission: Impossible” in a stormy and jazzy way displaying
plenty of energy and delicate wit. I couldn’t believe my eyes, when
suddenly I saw our tenor coming to the stage like Tom Cruise wearing
dark sunglasses and holding Peter Pejtsik’s very unique rock-cello in
his hand like a deadly machine gun. Then Peter used his instrument to
play the impressive leading solo of the music accompanied by all the
sessions of the vehement orchestra. It was great fun!
The next three pieces were sung by José Cura featuring three love songs
from the Mexican composer Armando Manzanero. All of them were beautifully
and intimately performed by his mellow and balmy timbre as different
stories. He characterized the first song (“Somos novios”) as
a love duet between our first violinist lady and him (with a kiss of
course). Then another love duet (“Esta
tarde vi llover”)
followed with our cellist (without a kiss). Yet, his rendition of the
third love song (“Como
yo te ame”)
excelled the best as he conveyed incredible and growing passion and
fire in the musical lines.
Then Cura welcomed the last one of our young musical talents on the
stage, Zoltán Sándor violinist, who surprisingly chose a really difficult
piece, “Libertango” from Astor Piazzolla. You thought he could
play everything on his instrument and we were just delighted in his
temperamental, jazzy and very rhythmic performance and good interaction
with the orchestra. Even our Maestro praised him nicely: “This is
the new generation, we can retire!”
The
concert continued with classic pop and rock-and-roll and José became
more and more talkative in his narration, so we laughed a lot. Leonard
Bernstein’s West Side Story (“Tonight”) was played in
the form of a wonderful duet of José Cura and Luca Bojtos. Luca changed
her dress and looked very pretty again and José complained that he would
do the same since it was hot on the stage. They delineated the different
phases, very fine texture and nice melody of the song together very
delicately and in good, intimate vocal harmony. The
orchestra also accompanied them very gently.
After
this, José told us his funny anecdote about how one of these classic
songs (“Yesterday” from the Beatles) make him a musician and
how his guitar helped him to ease his relationship with the girls and
find his wife with whom he has been together for 40 years now. He sang
the song in a wonderful inner harmony while he played the accompaniment
on his guitar. The orchestra gradually joined him with a gentle symphonic
and pop background. We fully enjoyed this beautiful melody, his sensual
vocal and the whole arrangement of the song. “I definitely have to
change my shirt!”-recalled José again realizing Réka’s newly acquired
very sexy summer dress, when he invited her to join to him for the next
song (“Let it be” from the Beatles). He also explained that there
was no difference between a classic pop (like “Yesterday” or
“Let it be”) and a Schubert song for him. They proved it with
a colorful duet where every session of the orchestra was involved in
a jazzy instrumentation.
José
remained in chatty mood and he shared his problem with us. “Yesterday
I asked Réka if she wanted to sing “Let it be” with me. She said: Yes,
but with one condition; you sing “Proud Mary” with me! So when she started
to sing it I immediately knew I was in trouble. Ladies and Gentlemen!
After 280 Otellos, 300 Pagliacci and 200 Samson, today I’m going to
sing you ROCK-AND-ROLL!”
The first few lines of the song sounded like a pleasant, classic "rhythm
and blues" melody lead by Réka’s vocal and José’s guitar, and then he
provided the double refrains with his gentle, dusky mumblings (“we’re
rolling, rolling on the river”) too. But all at once both the
rhythm and sound of the song were accelerated and intensified by the
bass guitars and drums and a wild rock-and-roll was launched by the
musicians. “Now, my problem!” – sighed our tenor.
Réka delivered her really temperamental and crazy rock lady attitude
and voice which was colorized by her screams. José
discarded his standing microphone and switched it to a smaller, mobile
one when he began to accompany her with a more diligent, variously improvised
blues solo of his deep-toned, husky voice and virtuoso rock dance. Among
them the winner was his unique jaw-shaking, double-talk, crazy jazz
version. There were moments where it was hard for Réka to keep singing
without laughing when she was surprised by José’s unexpected choreographies
and vocal reactions. As I looked around, I saw that many of us shook
the rock with our heads, bodies or legs in the seats and we also provided
the beat by our rhythmic applause. We had a lot of fun during this run!
José acknowledged our enthusiastic screams and loud applause at the
end with an exhausted smile: “Thank you, this is so good for my diet!
They liked it, eh? Can I stop singing opera? (No!) This is
so much fun! Otello is so difficult!”
For the last song José formed a trio with Luca and Réka, but first he
gave us a lesson about the mission of the young generation when he made
the conclusion: “There
is a future for the world if many of the people of my age who has put
the Earth in the situation we have today step down the horse and give
room to the young people. They would save the planet. That’s my hope
in the future!”
According to his words, they wanted to finish the concert in a very
optimistic way,
so they sang one of the most beautiful songs, the song of hope and future
(“Somewhere”
from Bernstein’s West Side Story).
The three voices were uniquely blended together and the trio composed
a moving and splendid completion of the concert.
After this, of course we didn’t let them to leave the stage. We insistently
produced our frenetic applause to provoke the encore and succeeded!
José Cura and Peter Pejtsik sat down on their seats with their guitar
and cello. They generously gave us an extra 10 minutes session.
After some cheerful minutes of more and more jokes
José and the musicians presented the ultima song of the evening (“Imagine”
from the Beatles). “This is going to be the last song, because they
are closing all the restaurants! I have no idea what will happen right
now. Every time we do this, we know where we start, but we do not know
where we finish, because we improvise it and even the opera orchestra
is improvising.” They started it with the guitar and the cello slowly,
and then the piano and the drums joined them as José called his
musicians one by one.
The music soon grew stronger and ran on several threads with greater
intensity escorted also by his narration. It was great to breathe the
music together with them especially when our tenor began to interpret
the text with his vocal and the whole stage was lost in their euphoric
jamming in more runs. In the last phase of the improvisation José also
sounded his Conga drums impressively.
We loudly and ardently celebrated our musicians again, but after a while
José Cura, Peter Pejtsik and their team kindly said good-bye to us and
finally they got a little rest. What a great experience we had! To finish
our wonderful trip to Tokaj, in addition to the compulsory wine tasting,
the next day we visited some really gorgeous plot for the sake of the
nearby castles (Füzér and Boldogkő).
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Imagine Snippet
-- click to listen
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