Bravo Cura
Celebrating José Cura--Singer, Conductor, Director, Composer
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Still in a GRRRRR mood over the Budapest Otello. But this is the last week to rant about it. Next week we'll be back with nary a thing about the production, the director, the lighting, the staging... It will become one of those mixed media memories where we will long remember José Cura's performance and basically forget everything else. Let's hope for at least one more Otello in José's future, because he definitely has the voice and acting chops for it. I can't imagine any opera house that would not be lucky to get such an artist. To those who loved the production with it's phallic symbol set and Desdemona corn-rows and ropes hitting us over the head with the spider web of deceit images and squishy black detritus littering the stage (symbolizing, I suppose, the crumbling of society? Who knows?) or folks dressed from tip to toe in black so they don't even exist as real people, sorry. Maybe we just aren't sophisticated enough to get the concept of presenting opera as a dream so each member of the audience becomes an independent director--still don't understand. I think everyone loves a well put together staging that engages the intellect but it shouldn't exhaust it. And everyone wants to be immersed in a production that provides new insights or illuminates a fresh look at a tired narrative but abrogating responsibility to the audience when a director can't find a way into the play doesn't really work. And at the end of the evening, if you have been truly caught up in the tragedy of the innocent Desdemona and the unraveling Otello, you should feel something more than relief that the evening was finally over. We'll be back with non-Otello stuff next week.
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Concert: 3 December, Budapest
Turandot in Seoul - Conductor
Confirmed dates for José Cura
on the podium
December 22, 23, 25,
26 |
Our Photos
A general statement of dismay: the lighting in this production was perhaps the worst we had ever experienced.
The first half of the first act was almost impenetrable black; the second half of the first act was so bright as to make the singers into silhouettes. Lighting was a little bit better (not much) in Act II, but the stage was still mostly black with some spotlights that sometimes illuminated the singers and sometimes didn't, depending on how and where they stood. Sometimes the light was so bright that half a face was erased and the other half hidden in shadows; sometimes one of the singers was illuminated while the second (or third) standing right next to him was lost in shadow. The second half of Act III was the best for being able to see what was going on, probably because there were so many folks involved that the director realized that it would make no sense to have the majority of the singers obscured in blackness but Act IV brought back the light box that either bathed the singers in light so bright it burned out their figures or became so dark they were puppets in shadows.
In addition, the light kept changing Kelvin temperatures, so sometimes the light was blue tinged, sometimes red tinged, sometimes green tinged, sometimes orange tinged, sometimes in the same scene. The lighting sometimes underexposed, sometimes overexposed. From our seats, it was frustrating and fatiguing trying to make sense out of a drama when the director so obviously went out of his way to make sure we couldn't actually see the details of it or the effort the actors were making to bring their characters to life The director's statement that layering a veneer of acting atop the music and lyrics robs the opera of its intrinsic nature seems even more bizarre when you see a demonstration of what he must mean: murky and murkier. Why bother with staging it at all if there is no value in the scenic, just the musical. If not providing all the key ingredients to an opera, why not just settle for a concert performance and spare the theater the expense of a stage setting at all?
It didn't help that the director also decided he needed to have a mesh curtain covering the stage to further obscure vision: apparently, he was going for a dream-like concept where nothing is clear and nothing is for sure and everything is black and white, except when it isn't: his way of presenting the story seemed to be to smudge everything and leave it to the singing actors to do the best they could under dire circumstances. Folks sitting close the the stage undoubtedly had fewer problem seeing the action and lucky for them. From our seats in the balcony it was a struggle to maintain interest in the opera we love so much because of the strain of trying to experience a dramatic as well as auditory performance. We shouldn't have to choose.
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Statement of Concept
To which we say poppycock.
Here's one reason it's a false narrative. One of the
beautiful qualities of opera
is that while it helps to
understand the language in
which the play is sung, it
shouldn't be necessary
because the singers and the
music unite to present the
emotions of the text even
when it
is impossible to
understand the singer during
a performance.
Reasons vary as
to why a director should
never rely on the audience
to interpret the text over
actually producing a play
that is self-explanatory,
from audience members not
knowing the language the
opera is sung in so they
have no idea what the
libretto says to non-native
singers not getting the
pronunciation quite right
and finally to the need of
singers to sing vowels and
consonant in a vocal way
that often leads to some
distortion that keep the
words from being easily
understood. Titling
systems help but they are a
relatively new addition to
the theater and some find
them a distraction.
Insisting that
the audience should know
what is going on because it
is clear through the text
which they don't know and
which is being performed by
singers who may not be
precise is strange, indeed,
yet there on rests one of
the director's primary
arguments for his approach
to this production.
We don't need to have
singing actors interpreting
the words we may not
understand; the
'subconscious' should do
that for. Shadow
figures and secrets known
only to the director are the
way to go.
Each member of
the audience will of course
take away thoughts and
feelings about a production
but it shouldn't be on the
audience to interpret the
intentions the director or
make sense of nonsense.
Or to sort
through the dross on the
stage to create a secondary
performance by picking up
the pieces left by an
incoherent director.
And if you want
me to become the actual
director, then give me access
to the lighting board so some
illumination can be added to
a very dark situation.
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Our Photos -- Act I Act I was VERY dark and was sometimes blue and sometimes yellow and sometimes white.
Act II
Act III
Act IV (sorry)
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Legacy
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Confirmed!
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Resources
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Visit at JoseCura.com |
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Last Updated: Monday, November 18, 2024 © Copyright:
Kira