I don't know whether I was in a particularly bad mood this evening, but I really did feel like giving up on the competition. I didn't particularly like any of the first four competitors. And I was getting in a bad mood with both Mary King and Gerald Finley. I love Gerald to pieces but he was being far too nice
The worst was Natalya Romaniw. Frankly, a lot of the time, she wasn't even singing, but screeching. I did get a bit annoyed about the 'Welsh' chauvinism. How crap to go along to an International Competition and cheer on somebody just because of their nationality, unless you happen to know them personally or as a performer. And if it's crap to do that, it's even crapper for the BBC to pander to that nationalism when, surely, there would have been far more English people watching than Welsh. (And, of course, she might be Welsh but, gosh, she lives in England). One suspects that she was only there because it is obligatory to have a Welsh entrant.
Katharine Tier's rendition of Dopo notte was awful. Handel sung in the style of Puccini, but bad Puccini. Her Wesendonck Lied wasn't so bad, in fact, I'm prepared to accept it was technically good, and she's got a Wagnerian voice blah-de-blah, but I found it boring.
Not much better was Vira Slywotzky's Crudele! - Non mi dir, which was painful to the ears. Loud and not particularly on pitch. I don't know Barber's Vanessa, but this did sound better. Not enough to make me enamoured of her.
I did get to the point of thinking Javier Arrey was going to win this heat, despite not being as impressive as at least two singers who didn't win theirs on previous nights. He was competent and pleasant, but I didn't for a minute think he was a contender against the three that have won their programmes and the two that didn't but should have!
So it was a relief to hear Jan Martiník (I've just read he was an Operalia finalist in 2007). He was polished and technically excellent, and I thought his voice beautiful, with no woofy bits or wavering. I liked him when he sang high (well, high for a bass) and I even liked him when he went way down low. So, he was the dead cert winner of the heat as far as I was concerned, but having so disagreed with Mary and Gerry about the other singers, I didn't know whether my judgement had deserted me. But they both seemed decisive in predicting him the winner, and the jury also named him the programme winner.
There's still tomorrow night to go (although it has already been recorded) with a bass, two sopranos, a tenor and a baritone, but before that, I would put my order as:
- Yuriy Mynenko, the Ukrainian counter-tenor
- Jan Martiník, the Czech bass
- Emiliya Ivanova, the Bulgarian soprano
- Ji-Min Park, the Korean tenor
- Eri Nakamura, the Japanese soprano
Incidentally, none of them being from countries you tend to think of with a production line of opera singers (although Korea does seem to be producing a lot nowadays, and Ukraine has probably produced a lot I think of as 'Russian').
!!!SPOILER ALERT!!!!
The Song Prize Final (I haven't heard any highlights of the heats) is between:
Javier Arrey (Chile, baritone)
Tomislav Lučić (Croatia, bass)
Update: Tomislav's unwell and has been replaced by Eri Nakamura
Jan Martiník (Czech R, bass)
Yuriy Mynenko (Ukraine, counter-tenor)
Natalya Romaniw (Wales, soprano)
