I wrote this a whole eight days before going to see her Live. Ooh! I was not sure whether to post it when I wrote it or hold it over. I'm debating whether to get her Puccini Arias. I expect I shall, in time, but should I get it at Festival Hall, and join a queue to get her to sign it? If she does a signing. She's a bit of a diva, so she might not. I wonder if she will use a prompter at the RFH. Or maybe she knows the words of the songs on the album she's promoting.
I saw her twice in La Rondine last year, and as well as the Festival Hall Recital next week, I shall also be seeing her in La Bohème next month. She has a gorgeous voice.
This album contains a fair proportion of unfamiliar or only vaguely familiar arias. Although I have to say, I have many many more tenor aria collections than soprano.
The entire selection of music is really rather gorgeous, and as her voice is also really rather special, this makes this a very special album.
My favourites on this include: Qui la voce sua soave...Ah! rendetemi la speme...Vien, diletto from Bellini's I puritani - the Mad Scene. I don't have enough Bellini in my life. I think my problem with bel canto is that the beautiful bits are very beautiful. But I want more than beautiful. Casta Diva is also by Bellini and is also beautiful, but if I was doing a 'competitive aria' thing, I would have to opt for Joan Sutherland.
Non! Non!...Ah! Je veux vire dans le rˆve from Gounod's Roméo et Juliette is quite possibly my new favourite soprano aria of this year. I just love the colaratura. And I just adore Angela singing this. I also single out Lascia ch'io pianga (Handel, Rinaldo)
Listening to this CD, I feel that I want to revise my recent post on Renée Fleming's By Request. I so much prefer Angela's voice by an order of magnitude. But never ever go back and change posts. And never set up a comparative competitive thing between divas. That having been said, I think I prefer Renée's rendition of Massanet's "I march on the railway, obeying as your voice calls..."
It's always amusing when you read Press Interviews with Angela, they always mention the diva-ish things she has done, such as requesting a stylist for a radio show, applying her lipstick during a televised Verdi Requiem, and expressing her horror that she saw some other singer going about her everyday business wearing jeans "Divas don't wear jeans." Then there are the stories of her throwing a bucket of water over a busker in the Covent Garden Piazza, behaviour I can only applaud with envy. Then the interview says, "But she was all sweetness, blah blah blah." I hope she does do a signing session. It will be interesting to see if she really is Countess Dracula.
To conclude, having got this last year and having played it a few times, I then didn't play it for a while, and I am pleasantly surprised listening to it now just how much I like it.
