Berlin calling? Yoncheva breaks into Medea
mainThe Bulgarian soprano will be the focal point of Barenboim’s Staatsoper next season, singing Cherubini’s heroine for the first time, it was announced yesterday.
The new intendant Matthias Schulz, who succeeds Jurgen Flimm next month, is also keen on having a Baroque mini-season to offset the diva dementia.
… but no French singer in the cast, and Andrea Breth directing.
Elsa Dreisig is half French, and Sonia Yoncheva studied in Geneva and speaks French at home! Is that a good enough percentage of the main roles – 40% that is?
If they announce “Medea”, it should be the horrendous 19th century italianized version, with those Lachner recitatives (otherwise it would read “Médée”), so what’s the need of french for this?
The Staatsoper used to have an excellent Baroque maxi-season (all of February) until Flimm canned it.
Proof that no “batons” around know anything about voices in our day and age! (Or are they laughing all the way to the bank?)
Where are the Serafins, Fürtwänglers, Sinopolis, etc… sad times for opera!
Or the Sawallisches. After today’s Metropolitan Opera live relay of Elektra, you may want to cleanse your ears (as much as a work like Elektra will allow) and soul with this:
https://youtu.be/8treQBQ7jp0
Elektra : Eva Marton
Chrysothemis : Cheryl Studer
Klytämnestra : Marjana Lipovšek
Orest : Bernd Weikl
Aegisth : Hermann Winkler
Der Pfleger des Orest : Kurt Moll
Die Vertraute : Victoria Wheeler
Die Schleppträgerin : Dorothea Geipel
Ein junger Diener : Ulrich Ress
Ein alter Diener : Alfred Kuhn
Die Aufseherin : Carmen Anhorn
Erste Magd : Daphne Evangelatos
Zweite Magd : Shirley Close
Dritte Magd : Birgit Calm
Vierte Magd : Julia Faulkner
Fünfte Magd : Caroline Maria Petrig
January 1990, Munich, Chor und Symphonie-Orchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks; Dirigent: Wolfgang Sawallisch
They don’t make them like they used to and all that.