Sharpenicity

Roméo et Juliette Their love is here to stay! Diana Damrau and Vittorio Grigolo in a new production of Gounod’s “Roméo et Juliette”  are being praised for their chemistry.  Is it “ A marriage  of true minds.” Here’s what they told a NYTimes writer: GRIGOLO:  It’s not out of nothing.  It’s like when you want to make a dish in the kitchen, you have good prime materials. Good tomato, good zucchini, good fish. Everything is so fresh. You just need to put it on the grill.   Me, Diana, a good conductor, a good director:  The ingredients are so good that it’s going to come out something nice. DAMRAU: It’s true. GRIGOLO: You just do the right thing. Just do it for real. We never fake it. DAMRAU: The kissing we fake. GRIGOLO;  What?  I don’t fake it.  I never fake it. So much for “he said/she said” discussions—especially when he and she sing  four stunning duets in Romeo and Juliette. This Met production with its classic yet unspecific

NABUCCO       A PRODUCTION FOR THE HISTORY BOOKS What becomes a legend most?  Remember that 1968 ad campaign that became a legend of its own almost fifty years ago.  That was the year that  Placido Domingo made his official debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York  when he substituted with little notice for Franco Corelli in Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur with Renata Tebaldi.   Who remembers that?   Who will ever forget Domingo in  the Met Opera Simulcast  of January 7, 2017,  of Verdi’s Nabucco ?  As Domingo adds a new role to his Met repertory as the Babylonian ruler Nabucco, Liudmyla Monastyrska sings the tour-de-force role of Abigaille, Nabucco’s willful daughter, with Jamie Barton as Fenena, Russell Thomas as Ismaele and Dmitri Belosselskiy as the prophet Zaccaria, Nacucco which is so seldom seen, was Verdi’s third opera and the one that  launched   his stunning career.   Aida by the way would come 30 some years later and would also include warring anc