Gertsamtkunstwerk

Alice in Twitterland

Today, BBC2 is showing the Royal Ballet's Alice in Wonderland, and the Royal Opera House's media department have tried, rather dismally in my view, to control the Twitter coverage.

To some extent, there is some benefit in establishing an obvious central reference point, but they have gone about it in such a cack-handed amateurish manner it makes me *Facepalm*

A few weeks ago they put a shout out for people willing to tweet about the TV coverage. I pointed out that anyone can tweet about anything, and anyone can use a hashtag. They replied that they had something very special planned, more details later. I responded something like 'Oh please don't aggregate all the tweets under a hashtag on a website, because that might go horribly wrong'

Today, they announced that they would be aggregating all the tweets under the hashtag #aliceintwitterland on the ROH blog, and also listing all the people who have signed up to tweet it. At which point I double facepalmed!

Such aggregation carries several risks.

1. Deliberate manipulation for cynical purposes: this is low risk in this case, but has been seen to go horribly wrong for more controversial ventures.
2. Spam hijacking for no particular purpose except promotion of porn or whatever, which should have no place on the ROH blog.
3. Tedium. It serves no purpose to read that So-and-so with 11 followers is Sky+ing #aliceintwitterland (noise, not sound).
4. Dozens of retweets of the same insightful comment. The repetitiveness is noise, not sound.

After Simon Boccanegra was broadcast I gathered together on my blog all the meaningful tweets I could find and blogged them

Simon Boccanegra: What Twitter said

Maybe I'm wrong but I firmly believe that this lasting record is of more value to those who are interested than a dynamic, unedited random listing of a few gems and much rubbish. Surely anyone genuinely interested won't want to wade through information overload actually while the ballet is being broadcast?

I think the choice of hashtag #aliceintwitterland is misguided and twee. For a start, because Twitter is limited to 140 characters*, hashtags work best when as short as they can be to be understood.

Furthermore, calling it 'Alice in Twitterland' makes the exercise about use of Twitter rather than about the televising of Alice in Wonderland, the Ballet, meta rather than substantive.

If people are sitting watching and enjoying (or not) the ballet they may feel moved to tweet about it, but this way it reads that if you want to want to tweet something, why not do it about the ballet?

Agreeing on a hashtag is a good idea - there were problems for the TUC March Against Cuts when there were great leftist splits about #26march,#march26, and, even, god help us, #326march. But rather than 'imposing' a 19-character hashtag for people to use, ignore or abuse, why not ask 'What are people using to hashtag ROH's Alice in Wonderland on BBC2?' I suspect a consensus may have grown around something like rohalice, aliceballet, or alicebbc2

There is a slight irritant in listing those who are tweeting about it. Some people will offer their names, and then happily carry on tweeting about their other activities and interests, engagingly or not. Possibly the most interesting tweeters won't even sign up to the list.

ROH is now saying

We haven't appointed a list of people. It's a sunny day and we wanted to make sure people remembered to tweet.

Which, I'm sorry to say this, still sounds like an attempt to impose some sort of order from the centre of what is essentially anarchic, which is the nub of the problem. The Royal Opera House don't *get* Twitter. They rarely use it to broadcast important info, eg cast changes, or even what's on this week and whether tickets are available.

By the time that one of their productions appears on the TV, they should have the confidence that people will judge it on its merits.

I will award them a C- for effort in trying to get social networks involved in what is obviously a very important broadcast for them and for ballet fans, but I'm afraid this a big bad 'F' for Fail in not understanding how Twitter works and failing to consult with their followers and friends.

 

* there are services that allow longer tweets, but they don't transfer well across apps - for example, when using Ubersocial on my phone, to see a longform tweet sent from Tweetdeck's Deckly I have to open my web-broswer

Hampshire photos

They've been a long time coming, although they have kept me amused over the Winter!

In November, quite possibly against our better judgement, we set out on a holiday to the seaside. It had all been a bit random: we decided on the New Forest, and then searched a website for the least expensive letting that met or exceeded our minimum criteria and was avaialble at the time we chose.

Which is how we ended up in Milford-on-Sea near Lymington, on the Hampshire/Dorset border Coincidentally, I stayed there for a fortnight in 1980, but even having revisited, I don't actually have any memories, which is slightly worrying!

We didn't know at the time, but it is a little bit of a foodie area: as I write, their food week is just drawing to a close. It would have been tempting to return - if only for tonight's Milford's Three Tenors, including John Hudson who I've seen as Don José at ENO and the Albert Hall -  but instead we will be visiting Dorset's Juassic Coast and coinciding with a foodweek (but at a time when local resident and much loved singer Billy "Traitor" Bragg is touring America), and I've signed up for more information about the Balham Food Festival

We found the Ladies Who Lunch in Hampshire an invaluable resource to supplement our 'Rough Guide' to the area, which will be re-used for the next holiday. We were staying almost directly opposite Verveine, one the LWL's top restaurants of 2010, and easy driving distance of the Crown in Everton. We were hugely impressed by the Zaika Indian in Milford, had a more than satisfactory pub meal at the Smugglers and had a lovely lunch at Egan's in Lymington. We were well aware of several other places we could have happily have tried in nearby Hordle, Barton and Mudeford.

I'm a city girl and have bad memories of restauranteurs in seaside resorts like Blackpool struggling with the word 'vegetarian', but I would recommend Rye and Milford as recent holiday destinations with exceptional food choices.

Our timing was slightly off, because the previous week had seen exceptionally mild November weather. On the other hand, it wasn't long after we returned home that Britain was hit by Snowmageddon. Still, we had some lovely coastal walks, and a glorious day in the New Forest.

I have finally finished loading 93 photos - which I hope represent some of the different aspects of our visit - into the album Hampshire

My one and only blogpost about *that* wedding

I have never fully modern monarchy. I understand the principle of 'keeping it in the family' and not sharing power. So, for example, the present Queen marrying a cousin, a Royal Prince, makes sense. I sort of even understand Charles marrying Diana, because in the absence of many white non-Catholic Princesses, a member of the aristocracy is hardly thinning the blood at all. But I don't really understand the idea that marrying a commoner in order to breed the next but two monarch is in any way preserving that hereditary principle the monarchists regard as sacrosanct.

Another thing I don't understand is why there is such approval of the Middleton Family. It is very clear that almost from birth, Ma 'Doors to Manual' Middleton groomed her daughter to marry William. Kate allegedly chose that course at that University with the intention of catching him. I'm sure there were probably many girls born in the 80s who entertained similar thoughts, or their mothers did. But very few were groomed.

It's starnge, because if a mother grooms a daughter to be a sex-worker, society as a whole looks on aghast. In my opinion, quite rightly. I'm just struggling to find any significant difference between grooming a daughter for sex work and grooming a daughter to have sex and breed with a specific man because of his status and untold wealth.

It's even stranger because as far as I'm aware (I can't say I have done much research), Doors-to-Manual is as important to the family business as is Mr Doors-to-Manual. It seems even stranger that someone who is demonstrably successful in business is so determined that her daughter should get her entire identity from how her sexual organs function.

And finally, I don't really understand how this blind fawning over the monarchy works. There are various opposing positions I do understand,

• I have considered all the options and my opinion is that a constitutional monarchy is no worse than any other;
• It's not a system I'd introduce from scratch but as we have it, I'm perfectly content
• I fully support the monarchy because although I am less important than them, their continued existence makes me more important than commoners
• I'm really not interested
• I have some views, but life's too short to get worked up about them
• I keep being told they bring in tourist income and I'm too lazy to find the research that refutes this argument
• I'd like to see a referendum but not until after QEII dies
• Having even a symbolic monachy is the root of most of our undemocratic practices
• Off with their heads

What I don't understand is people who sit at the bottom of a hierarchical system, and yet praise that hierarchical system, and, furthermore, heap praise on the individuals who happen to have been born higher up, irrespective of (or in some cases despite) their skills, attributes and personal behaviour. They're not even that interesting as celebrities, doing nothing of exceptional virtue or achievement or behaving so atrociously that we can we satisfy ourselves as to our remarkable superiority. Even Prince Andrew's behaviour is largely a result of him being promoted well above his ability and not able to meet unreasonable expectations.

And come the day itself, people will await with bated breath the bestowal of titles onto the Happy Couple, as if the titles are an earned promotion. The titles will be explained in hush-toned as signifying some growing in importance of Prince Wills, whilst most of us with a functioning brain will think 'Hold on! Regardless of one's views, isn't being Prince William important enough already? Will becoming Duke of Helmand and Anglesey somehow make it easier for him to book a table at a swanky restaurant than being, you know, heir presumptive to the throne?'

Assault in the supermarket

Popped into the local shop to buy a loaf of bread. Typically for this time of evening, there's a queue to pay. The woman in front of me leaves her basket where she was standing and goes for a wander round. While she's away, three people are called to the checkouts, so I'm in a quandary. Do I stand there & patiently await her return,  causing all the people behind me to start tutting and telling me to move up?  I moved up, past her abandoned basket.

Actually, it wasn't that much of a quandary: I've seen this trick before: do half your shopping, join the queue, and leave your basket as a place-marker while you get several more items.

I've also seen people abandon their shopping and leave the shop. It's radically different from when someone takes maybe three steps to pick up something they've just spotted and returns immediately. Or when somebody says 'please' and 'thank you'. Or 'D'you mind?' or even just acknowledges you are there.

Am I supposed to be a mind reader?

She arrives back and says "Sorry!" and thumps me in the arm, shouting "Move out of the way. I was before you!". To which I replied,

"Keep your hands off me!" Raising my voice, to make sure enough people heard I exclaimed "You hit me!"

"But I left my basket on the floor!"

"You left the queue," I said. She tries pushing me out of the way, then repeatedly shoves me in the calves with her basket.

Again I say "Don't you touch me!" Again she says she left her basket on the floor. Again I say she left the queue. At which point she starts calling me a liar, over and over again, before going off into an incoherent spiel, quite possibly not in English.

Knowing the security guard was hovering, I said calmly "You hit me" and again she calls me a liar as she attempts to push me aside, as her tirade becomes increasingly hysterical.

Objectively, the scenario is 50-50. There is some sort of unspoken rule about how long you can be out of the queue without squandering your place. Leaving your basket there as a trip hazard doesn't make any difference (incidentally where the store staff have already left one of their restocking trollies right by the bread where people customarily queue).

If she had been frail in any way I would probably have conceded. If she had addressed me in a civil manner,  I would have shrugged and thought "I can't be bothered arguing the toss". But because she immediately hit me, and then continued to shove me, I was not prepared to give ground.

I've seen her type before. They think that by calling you a liar, or some other personal insult, you will be cowed, or at least it will distract attention from her. But I only made two statements - a) you hit me and b) you left the queue, both of which she had already confirmed by justifying them by her leaving her basket on the floor! I am fairly certain that she was trying to provoke a racist insult out of me. Do I look that stupid?

 

 

Le comte Ory

I went to see this Rossini opera at my local cinema, in a transmission from the New York Metropolitan opera.

I rather wish I had trusted my instincts and not gone. I don't like Rossini and was only tempted by a superb trio of principals - Juan Diego Flórez, Joyce di Donato and Diana Damrau. All three sang excellently - as far as I can tell in an opera I didn't know and with music I didn't like. Well, I say I didn't like it, but in fairness there were a few good bits, because, it seems Rossini's rip-off of Gluck is slightly more enjoyable of his rip-off of Mozart.

As I say, the leading singers were excellent and I didn't notice any particular weak links in the lesser roles. The production contained a lot that was stupid, with my particular low-light being the various occasions when various people carried plastic trees around.

It was basically played for shit and giggles as low rent slapstick. I'm not sure that it could have been played any other way. It was the slightest of stories with very little characterisation, so having both JDF and DD in particular camping it up in the style of Victorian melodrama was probably very sensible.

I was actually enjoying parts of Act II. There was even a storm scene with some hints of Gluck in it, during which I revised my axiom about operatic storms.

All great operas have a storm scene.
Except for Le Nozze di Figaro (imagine what a great opera that would be with a storm scene)
Having a storm scene doesn't make an opera great

Then they went and spoiled it all by having a rape - or attempted rape - scene (I don't know, I didn't stay) which was played entirely for its comedy potential. I'm afraid I got up and walked out at the point where the soprano sang (I paraphrase) "Yuck, he's pressing my hand against his heart" and the mezzo en travesti sings "Go on, Go along, indulge him, for your own good".

I have long been someone who argues for reality in drama, be it opera, plays, film or TV. I don't believe that you should censor a rape (or attempted rape) any more than you would a murder or other forms of violence.

I don't have too great a problem with them being graphically explicit, providing there are adequate warnings so that people can choose not to see them. It's almost impossible to be historically realistic without including rapes, so even if it's not written into the original libretto I don't have any great objections to rape being portrayed as a weapon of war, as it inevitably was through history and still is today. Perhaps I was made more sensitive by having read just this morning Kath Viner's superb piece, City of Joy: New hope for Congo's brutalised women

I simply don't like rape being played as comedy. In a decent opera, or even in Anna Nicole, there would have been an opportunity to stop the tomfoolery and make the audience stop, think, and re-examine the motives and behaviours of the characters, and perhaps themselves. That's what Great Art, and Anna Nicole, does.

It's like life: you've been fooling around, then someone says "Actually that happened to my best friend" and everyone starts shuffling their papers or exclaiming "Is that the time?". It would be weird if people carried on laughing and joking - only that's what happened in this.

I think partly, I suspect that most of the people giggling away (by no means a majority of the audience) lack the capacity to understand what is happening. It's just a series of moves they fail to compute. Similarly to when there are erotic scenes, there are are certain people who insist on guffawing, parlty because they consider it their moral duty to do so but largely because they are incapable of understanding beyond the most functional aspects of sex. Even worse are the people who laugh because their head tells them they ought to, rather than it being an irrepressible reflex action as happens with genuine comedy.

Still, the costumes were nice, and I guess, that's all that matters!

    
Someone's doneablogpost on the dresses Diane Damrau wore. By 'done a blogpost', I mean she's posted some photos

The Met Winks Its Way Through Rossini: Bartlett Sher’s Sorry 'Le Comte Ory'

As a by the way, Juan Diego's wife Julia had a baby boy Leandro 35 minutes before curtain up.

Plácido in Tokyo

He arrived in Tokyo  on Thursday

Domingo's shows will go on in Japan

Placido Domingo's U.S. representatives say the Spanish tenor has arrived in Japan and plans to perform two Tokyo shows as planned despite Thursday's earthquake.

Domingo, 70, is going ahead with his April 10 concert at NHK Hall and April 13 at Suntory Hall. His wife and granddaughter have joined him on the trip to Japan...

...Ana Maria Martinez, who was scheduled to perform with Domingo, has canceled, however, and Virginia Tola will now appear on stage with him instead.

Tenor Placido Domingo signals support for Japan by going ahead with concerts

There will be collection boxes at the performances. Donations will be added to part of the proceeds from ticket sales and given to the Japanese Red Cross to aid the earthquake relief effort.

Domingo will perform a special arrangement on April 10, which includes a prayer for Japan.

Sunday's concert will be streamed live on Ustream. At that link it says, 17:30; the NHK Hall website suggests a start time of 15:30 (with doors opening at 14:45).

Especialy for people in Western Europe and the Americas, it may be worth remembering that Japan is the Land of the Rising Sun. Tokyo time is 8 hours ahead of London Time (my timezone), so if that is a 15:30 start, I shall be up just before 7.30 am. On Sunday.

I had been looking at the sites for the two venues, wondering if the concerts would go ahead, and I saw that several events with overseas artists at both halls have been cancelled. Of course, earthquakes are a specialist interest for Plácido, but as one of my friends on Twitter said "Good for him! Will be great morale boost for Japanese."

Plácido Domingo vivió fuerte réplica en Japón: "El piso 29 de este hotel era un baile"

El tenor, que creció en México y perdió familiares en el devastador terremoto de 1985, recordó cómo de niño vivía allí los temblores junto con su hermana "como un juego"; pero al crecer "te das cuenta de que es algo horroroso", indicó.

Update:

This site also says Sunday's concert starts at 1530 Tokyo time, so either Ustream currently has the time wrong or isn't actually streaming 'live' but delayed/recorded. So I'm still getting up at 7.30

Pulling a sickie (may contain elements of lie)

A few weeks ago that it dawned on me that waking up in the morning and feeling too grotty for work is pointless before a cup of coffee or tea, and probably a shower, to wake up. This week, with the sudden appearance of heat and sun necessitating a wardrobe shift, I remembered a day from years ago.

It was this time of year and it suddenly got hot. I didn't want to wear black opaque tights to work but my legs had been neglected too long for short skirt and bare legs, so I rang in sick with 'slight migraine' and booked myself a waxing at the salon. Whoever took my call mentioned that my manager 'Dave' was unexpectedly working at home.

At the time, I lived on a road just to the East of Streatham High Road near St Leonard's Junction; Dave lived on a road just to the West of Streatham High Road near St Leonard's Junction. Knowing Dave, I suspected he would find himself a pub with a beer garden to spend the day.

I went to the beauty salon, got my legs done, and was wandering back up the High Road past the dry-cleaner's, and thought 'I really must pick up that suit I left there and I've lost the ticket for', so I went in and explained the situation. They said I had to sign the book of lost tickets. Trained and paid to be nosey, I perused the names above mine. The entry immediately above mine was 'Dave Manager'. Ten minutes previously.

I thought that was a lucky escape, but a few months later I was off sick and went into Croydon. As I walked past a pub, who should fall out of it but Dave my manager. We greeted each other cheerily, but I spent an uncomfortable weekend, knowing that I had called in sick and had been spotted in Croydon by my manager. On the Monday I nonchalantly commented at work: "I wonder if Dave's reviewed my file yet..." to which a colleague replied "I doubt it, he was off sick on Friday."

 

Premature ejaculation

There are bus stops that take you by surprise. If you use them often, you learn to stand up and ring the bell almost as soon as the bus leaves the previous bus-stop. I'm thinking particularly about the bus stop outside the Security Service on Millbank, and the Holmewood Gardens stop on Brixton Hill.

And then there is Vauxhall bus station and Brixton town centre. The bus waits at traffic lights to exit Vauxhall Bridge. It pulls into Vauxhall bus station. It drives very slowly to the end of VBS, then executes a 180 degree turn before driving the entire length back again, and stopping at the bus stop, where I stand up and get off, two steps behind the person who has mumbled 'sorry' in order to squeeze past me at the traffic lights. Similarly at Brixton, except that the slow slow cruise of the bus station punctuated by the volte face is replaced by a shudder shudder bump bump stop jerk jerk creep, unsettling the contents of your stomach, behind a dozen other buses. I stand up only as it stops at the bus-stop; if it's a bus that's terminating, I get off by the front door and am at the pedestrian crossing before the person who's previously pushed me out of the way in order to stand on the stairs for several long minutes.

They don't irritate me but amuse me. So very full of themselves, so stressed out, and for no purpose.

This morning at the crossing, I observed something much more disturbing.

A bus driver calculated that he didn't have enough space to move forward and join the tail end of the standing traffic without having his backside parked across the pedestrian crossing. So he stopped, until his exit from the crossing was clear. My understanding is that this is a correct reading of the Highway Code. This was the cue for about twenty people to cross in front of the bus, despite the traffic lights being green. Rather, one crossed and 19 or so followed him.

From the outside of the bus came a cyclist, peddling along the road. Not one of those 20 looked to see whether anyone was coming. Or if they did:

it's only a cyclist - and a woman in a flowery skirt at that, with a basket on the front of her bike

They just walked into her as she cycled along the road. I was gobsmacked!  If I was her I would have been frightened or angry, surrounded by what was almost a frenzied mob of arseholes unable to control themselves for the extra thirty seconds until the traffic lights turned red and the green man appeared for pedestrians.

Their arrogance is breathtaking, the barely constrained aggression saddening. Not one of them can control his premature ejaculation. I can't help wondering if they get their wanking over as quickly as possible rather than taking time to pleasure their partners (assuming they have a partner).

Plácido in Mexico City

Previews

Plácido Domingo celebra 70 años de vida y 50 de debutar en México

Plácido Domingo, un común entre México y España

Calderón condecora a Plácido Domingo por medio siglo de cantante profesional

Mexico's president bestows award on Placido Domingo

Reviews:

Placido Domingo celebrates his 70th birthday in Mexico

Plácido Domingo corrobora en México que sigue siendo «el rey»

Ovaciona México a Plácido Domingo

A sus 70 años, el tenor Plácido Domingo  demostró anoche que su retiro aún está lejos.

Domingo enamoró al público mexicano

Fotos

Plácido Domingo se lleva el aplauso de García Márquez en México

Calderón "entregó ahí a Plácido Domingo un reconocimiento del gobierno de México" por su aniversario y "le expresó que su virtuosismo y su trayectoria profesional lo han convertido en un orgullo para todos los mexicanos", informó este miércoles la Presidencia de México en un comunicado.

(I'm resisting on remarking that the concert was conducted by a young female conductor, because female conductors, young or otherwise shouldn't be remarkable...)

Pre-match entertainment for the Attention Deficit

I get the idea of laying on top-class entertainment before what is apparently an important baseball match (LA Dodgers vs someone or other), but this 2 minute 45 video has to be seen to be believed.

I only watched because it featured Plácido singing the US National Anthem.

I mean, I think that's quite cool, get a top class singer (and baseball fan) to sing the National Anthem. I also think it's quite cool to lay on some fireworks, too. (I quite like fireworks at a distance and properly controlled). And, even though I'm a not a  cheerleader for military action, I do get quite unreasonably excited about military hardware.

But what I can't understand is: why have them all going on at the same time, in just 2½ minutes, when separated out, the entertainment could last maybe five minutes. All I can say is, it's hyperactivity gone mad!

 

Enjoy!

Plácido in Buenos Aires

I posted a few links last week about the kerfuffle surrounding the on/off/on/off/on concert that Plácido (eventually) gave in Buenos Aires last Thursday. Reports that he mediated with the striking orchestral musicians and chorus who were persuaded to perform in this free open-air concert; then heavy rain postponed it from the Wednesday to the Thursday.

“Sigue el conflicto”

 Statement from the union

"Decidimos tocar en el concierto como un reconocimiento hacia Plácido Domingo por su actitud solidaria, y en atención a los miles de espectadores que sabíamos iban a venir...

...Inicialmente no íbamos a tocar, pero Plácido Domingo, además de ser un gran artista, es un compañero. En cuanto llegó a Buenos Aires le pedimos una entrevista, que concedió inmediatamente"

He gave another concert earlier, in the theatre, for the theatre workers and their families.

It was streamed over the internet from an Argentinian TV station, so I stayed up to watch it.

(As as side note I was pondering a couple of weeks ago - a sign of my relatively middle-age is that I still think of the internet as a new-fangled contraption. I didn't get on the net until a few weeks short of 30, and I prefer to enjoy music and vision via the more old-fashioned media of my youth. When watching this concert online, I realised that I'm not as conservative as I thought. It was great to be able to watch it, live, which wouldn't have been possible without the internet. But the quality of the stream was not great. Perhaps they have better internet in Argentina than in Britain and I was suffering from a low download rate, but in any case, the quality was no better than live Trans-Atlantic TV broadcasts from 35-40 years ago, and without the ability to capture it for posterity).

Plácido Domingo deslumbró a una multitud en la 9 de Julio

 - includes a list of some of the numbers he performed

Plácido Domingo canta en Buenos Aires ante 120.000 personas

Plácido Domingo demostró una vez más su predisposición al encanto personal, la pasión por la música por encima de todas las cosas y una falta de divismo que a todos emociona por igual.

This also mentions that he brought his little grandsons Alvarito and Plácidito onto the stage at the end, though Alvarito threw a wobbly at the sound of an air horn being sounded from the crowd!

There are several clips - covering the entire concert  - on YouTube:

1. Opening Chorus

2. O Souverain o juge o pere/Depuis le jour (Virginia Tola)

 

3. Wintersturme/ Io son l'umile ancella

 

4. Nemico della patria &  a soprano aria I can't place

 

5. Father/daughter reunion from Boccanegra

(I'm not entirely sure that a father-daughter scene ought to be that hot!)

 

6. Plácido conducts the overture to La forza del destino, which I'm afraid rather highlights what a lame conductor Eugene Kohn is (IMO)

Second half

7. Father/daughter duet from Rigoletto

(counter-intuitively, his lower notes sound fabulous to me, more so than his higher notes!)

 

(continues into the next clip, consistent with the TV channel's erroneous labelling of it as Aida - also contains blink-and-you'll-miss-it shots of the autocue screen!)

8. Rigoletto duet (end)/Plácido's speech in solidarity with the striking workers/Plácido conducts the Grand March from Aida

 

9. Soprano aria from El barberillo de Lavapiés / Amor, vida de mi vida /  Chorus from Dona Francisquita

 

10. Aria from  La del manojo de rosas/I Could Have Danced All Night/No puede ser

 

Encores

11. Lippen Schweigen (with obligatory waltz -  oh you know the form, whoever the soprano!)/Jurame/Contigo En La Distancia/Besame Mucho (from 12:20) /Volver/A Media Luz

(Plácido looking sexier the more he relaxes and is enjoying himself. In my opinion) 

 

12. Mi Buenos Aries Querida/Granada/El Dia Que Me Quieras and final applause.

 

I enjoyed watching the concert on line, and I have enjoyed watching it again on YouTube, (with some fast forwarding). I think he sounded a lot better singing tenor arias than the baritone numbers, and I do enjoy some of the lighter pieces especially Besame Mucho and Granada.

But an outdoors concert, on my laptop (with its less than optimum audio) is not the best way to hear Plácido. I also enjoyed Virginia Tola. She didn't exactly set me alight and shoot to the top of my soprano list, and anyway, I don't watch these things for the soprano. Although I am looking forward immensely to Angela Gheorghiu at O2.

I have to confess when watching clips of concerts such as this I feel an overwhelming envy of the soprano, whoever she may be. I know it's entertainment, a show, but, nevertheless, I dream of being looked at and held by Plácido in that way!

This blogpost has taken approximately four hours to compile (over an hour without the YouTube watching), so to those who think all I do is copy-and-paste a link from a Google Alert, no, it takes a bit more than that!