Prima la musica

Après un rêve

I have a review of this CD forthcoming for Limelight, so I won't say much now; just that, unless the repertoire on this disc is anathema to you — and how could it be? — then you probably need to know this. I remember saying almost exactly the same thing when I first heard her last song recital disc, Evocation. Sandrine's Handel album, Opera seria, is up there with the best of them, but I swear, her art song discs are even better. This one includes songs by two of my favouritest composers, Poulenc and Richard Strauss, which helps, but it's Sandrine who makes this so essential. And it's funny, because I saw her sing a few Schubert songs at Wigmore Hall while I was in London, and wasn't entirely convinced by her way with Lieder in person, but on disc, her German songs are as gorgeous as her French. Her English songs — Britten folksong arrangements, of all things! — ain't bad either. In fact they're fabulous. Once you've heard "Down By the Salley Gardens" with a faint French accent, you'll never want to hear it any other way.

Update: My review for Limelight is now online. 

Here's a video somebody's uploaded to go with the title track. Featuring audio from Sandrine and (I'm not quite sure why) images of Ava Gardner, Audrey Hepburn, Ingrid Bergman and Elizabeth Taylor. 

Hurricane Joyce

She's still the best thing about the Met's Ariadne and I still wish she were in the whole opera. Her ovation at the end of the Prologue beat everyone else's, and as transcendent as the music in the Opera is, nothing Ariadne or Bacchus could throw at me could make me as teary as Joyce in full flight. Joyce in Strauss: there's just nothing wrong with that. I want to hear her sing Oktavian. I want to hear her sing every Strauss role ever — well, all the pretty ones — rewritten for mezzo. A mezzo Arabella? She could totally make that work. And now I am trying with every fibre of my being not to think of the Cendrillon she's about to sing in London, or the touring Ariodante, because I can't follow her everywhere. Besides, I have been insanely fortunate to be in New York at the right time for both her Isolier and her Komponist. That should suffice. But hey, the more Joyce, the better. I eagerly await my next fix, wherever and whenever that might be. 

Oh and I met her tonight for the first time. This definitely enhances the thrill of it all.

Anything Goes

I went to see Anything Goes on Saturday afternoon, my first Broadway show ever. I'm a sucker for a good old-fashioned musical. I'm also thoroughly unqualified to make any particular comment on the standard of what I saw, but it was fairly spectacular and a whole lotta fun. I don't know that I would want to hear Sutton Foster sing everything, but frankly, anyone who can sing like that, charm like that, get laughs like that and then tap dance for ten minutes and immediately start singing again wins my eternal admiration. Of course, Joel Grey still pretty much stole the show out from under her, but justifiably so, and in the nicest possible way. He was hilarious just by standing there. Somehow every time I go to a play or a musical, there's always somebody whose acting fills me with homicidal levels of irritation, but not this time — no weak link, no slapworthy ingenue. Adam Godley was a scream as Lord Evelyn Oakleigh. And those dance numbers. My GOD. The spirit of Busby Berkeley lives on. It was a great show. More than ample compensation for our failure to get tickets for Book of Mormon. 

Music City

For a while there, we thought the horrific storms in the South might have foiled our plans: an 11AM departure for Nashville turned into 7.30PM and then 8.30PM, and meanwhile the weather reports on TV made us wonder if we should be going there at all. But it all came right eventually — the plane left, we had a magnificent view of Manhattan by night which just about made the nine hours in La Guardia's food court worthwhile, and we arrived in Nashville to gorgeous warm weather.

The delay meant just two full days instead of two and a half, but we still managed to pack plenty in. Highlights? The Grand Ole Opry, clearly, where most of the names on the bill were unfamiliar but most turned out to be hugely entertaining. I mentioned the fabulous Jean Shepard — still going strong at 77 — in my previous post. I also loved Bobby Osborne and the Rocky Top Express, not surprising since I am a bluegrass girl at heart.

  

And did you know Nashville had a full scale replica of the Parthenon? I didn't, until somebody on Twitter told me about it the night before I left. As it turned out, it was just across the road from our hotel. It's seriously impressive and seriously weird. I loved it. Particularly the insanely huge and very very gold statue of Athena inside. 

I loved wandering down Broadway and hearing live music from every second doorway. I went on a couple of productive souvenir shopping sprees — one at 11pm, because apparently nothing on Broadway ever closes, and one at the Mecca which is the Country Music Hall of Fame. I had a hilarious fried chicken dinner on the rooftop of the charmingly disorganised and rough-around-the-edges Wild Bill's Beignets and Bikes — our waiter Brian is my new favourite waiter ever. And I could have wandered around Hatch Show Print for hours, plotting the abduction of their adorable store cat and coveting every single poster on the wall.

Two days isn't nearly enough to do the town justice, clearly, but we sure tried our best and I'm determined to get back there, sooner rather than later. Sing it, Dolly.