Una volta...(e due, e tre)

Dear Opera Australia,

La fille du régiment for Taryn Fiebig, please. The moment there's a suitable tenor on the roster to sing Tonio, as none of the current crop could. Failing that, maybe L'elisir d'amore. Not, repeat not, Don Pasquale as I can't stand Norina.

Yours wistfully,
Sarah

The above just one of many happy thoughts running through my mind during my second helping of La Cenerentola last night. I'm quite besotted with this show. It's just lovely. I was looking forward to it anyway, just because it's Cenerentola (and isn't Barbiere) but I don't think I expected to love it quite so much. But the moment I sat down and saw the curtain, a storybook border, somehow I just thought — this is going to be good. And it was.

There was Dominica Matthews being a gorgeous Angiolina. She doesn't quite radiate extreme divadom but I think there's a glimmer (or ten) of something there. Apart from anything else, she very definitely has a Dominica Sound. Every note is distinctively hers and I could pick it blindfolded. I love the evident care she's taken over her diction and over the meaning of the words she's singing. Sounds obvious but to judge by some others (who will remain nameless and aren't in this opera anyway) it possibly isn't. But, for instance, her perfect double consonant in "l'innocenza" is much appreciated. Definitely my favourite opera singing Matthews. (There are a few.)

But oh...

Joshua Bloom. The Mary Poppins of Opera Australia, practically perfect in every way. The funniest, charmingest, more irresistible presence on stage and, just to add to the fun, in possession of an outrageously beautiful voice. A voice which he has the wit, confidence and technical assurance to play around with at will. He's devastatingly funny to watch, but the comedy is as audible as it is visible. I don't think I've ever laughed as much during an opera as I did during his "Un segreto d'importanza" scene with Don Magnifico, where, taking his cue from the latter's aside along the lines of "is it me he wants to marry?", he proceeds to flirt shamelessly with him, beautifully outrageous. I loved the show anyway but Joshua is 99% of the reason I went for a second performance and will probably manage a third before it closes.

But wait, there's more.

Not only the baritone, but also — the conductor. I know, I'm a terrible person and usually don't have much to say about the conductor; at least now I can make slight amends. I was in the stalls last week, but last night I was back in my usual spot (Loge X, my favourite) from where I can look down into the pit. I did so, and discovered that Brad Cohen is at least as fascinating to watch in performance as any of the singers he was conducting. I like a conductor who creates the illusion the music is actually coming from him (or her). Brad did that. He probably did something similar the last time I heard him conduct, but that was Fedora and every ounce of my attention was elsewhere. Anyway, when the action on stage were less than riveting (I'll be blunt: Alidoro and Don Magnifico) I watched the pit instead, and it took some effort to drag my eyes back to the stage when the interesting people returned.

Two more things — Tisbe and Clorinda. Jacqueline Dark is Tisbe, the mezzo sister. Explain to me, ye powers, why Jacqueline's OA repertoire so far is a series of Thankless Mezzo Roles (Suzuki, Flora, Emilia and so on) with only a couple of lead roles to be found? While Victorian Opera, at least, has had the good sense to throw a Carmen and a Dorabella her way. She's excellent! She's the kind of mezzo Opera Australia needs and doesn't have nearly enough of. I'd love to hear her Dorabella. Maybe Dalila? She's not meant for pants roles but in gorgeous, girly mezzo repertoire, meatier roles than Tisbe, she must be a joy.

And, to come full circle, Clorinda is the suddenly magical Taryn Fiebig. I've heard Taryn in snatches of Janacek, Dvorak, Puccini and Handel and while it was all quite pretty, none of it was a patch on her performance here. Previously I had been fleetingly charmed, perhaps, but not electrified, and ultimately unmoved. Bring her into bel canto, though, and all of sudden she's the kind of singer I fall in love with. Exquisite. Not generally what you'd expect from a so-called ugly stepsister. But then she isn't an ugly stepsister. Badly behaved, silly and vain, yes. However, she looks lovely and her bad behaviour is charmingly incorrigible rather than malevolent. Barring Melanie Lynskey, she might be the most likeable stepsister a Cinderella has ever had. It was when she gave glittery, glorious voice to Clorinda's few solo lines near the beginning of Act II — making a couple of throwaway remarks more beautiful than they've any right to sound — that I thought: MARIE. Yes, please. Will it, can it happen? Who knows. But a girl can dream.

And now, as Cinderella Hour draws ever nearer, and as I've no wish to turn into a pumpkin, I shall finish.

Comments

[bardassa]

a) You have seen Fedora!!!! I adore that opera, I have every commercial recording dating back to Columbia 1929.
b)Josh Bloom sings florid passages with the same assurance as a female singer, it's really incredible.
c) Brad Cohen is secretly a Ken Doll

[Sarah]

a) Yes I have!!! But!!! You wouldn't approve of who was singing Fedora.
b) It is.
c) Isn't he just.