Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Erykah et Melisande: Two Nights in Toronto
The ICRS featured long hours in a hotel ballroom. It was a very interesting affair that I will be considering for some time. But that will be the subject of another post. My job here is to talk about how I had two very fine and complementary musical experiences just blocks away from my hotel.
On the first night I went from a 50th floor bar social of my fellow members of the refurbishing community to Massey Hall to see Erykah Badu on the only Canadian date of her current tour. Massey Hall is an impressive rock of a structure with an impressive history. It is one of the coolest of classic auditoriums I have been in. The walls in the bar downstairs document the first 100 years of its 114 year history. I'm kind of thinking its accurate to say that the Massey saw most of the great stars of last century from Caruso to top pop artists of every decade.
And I'm also told you can order drinks before the first set to be ready for you at intermission. That's very cool.
Tonight was going to be lovely history too. Badu's latest album is the best new album I have heard in months and months. It is her right punch to adjust the career. I love this record. Surprisingly, she did only four numbers (maybe five) from Amerykah Pt 1. They were really strong, but Erykah is smart not to put too much of any one brand out for too long.
The band took a while to get organized. The back singers are all women who look like hip hop Raelettes. They have tight cream envelope slip dresses with orange scarves on them grabbing to outside or inside hip and beyond. They are paramilitary in their deliberation in V formation outside to into the central Erykah zone with her monopod keyboard on one side and table with her shakers, Mac notebook for loud sample cues mainly, and clear liquid that she drank from the cup lid of her red thermos that had some kind of Erykah logo on it.
As I said Amerykah povided the framework for her to go off and do her diva sequence as stylish as Josephine Baker or Lena Horne. She did this number with beach balls and streamers that I've been thinking about long after the performance. Her last note of the evening was this high perfect intense one feeling almost like the whole evening was designed to that moment. This show was a treasure.
I love Tristan and Isolde. And Fellini and Bergman films. This combination can all be found in Debussy's Peleas et Melisande. I love the half gurgle themes bubbling off and becoming something unexpected bumping off of some more big notes or spaces. I appreciate taking overwrought Romantic stuff with a capital R to far extremes here. I first heard this opera on a Met broadcast 24 years ago. Reading libretto to the opera revealed how truly goofy the symbolism was but how mysterious and special it was too.
I had the most remarkable $20 seat in the world purchased three hours before curtain. They claimed it had obscure view but that only meant that part of the first well scene was cut off. Big Deal.
The soprano, whose name escapes me, is credited as doing the vocals at the end of the second Lord of the Rings movies. She was impressive, but so too was the entire production which had some diverse things happening on stage. Gounod the cuckhold paranoid wandered around in an outfit that looked just like the pajamas Henri Matisse was wearing in the Cartier Bresson portraits except this dude was about twice as big. These folks portrayed the family and kingdom in this film as beyond decline mentally. They are losing their souls and emotions in front of you on a bleak landscape and a dwelling that is only portrayed as a kind of dock with most of the main action happening on the same level practically as the row of boxes I was sitting at.
The Canadian Opera Company is a class operation. The Four Seasons Hall a beautiful modern acoustically sensitive room. I got to watch the pit from my vantage point as well and was amazed how young the orchestra was. Everyone in there from my perspective seemed 35 or younger. They sounded great executing Debussy's musical statements with brilliance and mysterious. Strings and winds are given quite a workout. Brass doesn't figure a lot in this score except for a few key moments. Even dreams of weirdness need a little brightening sometimes.
posted by well-executed buffet at 9:02 PM
Comments:
Post a Comment