Ovations for Domingo in Vienna

Ovations for Domingo in Vienna

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norman lebrecht

October 27, 2019

Macbeth, after a nervous start, was cheered to the rafters.

Placido Domingo came in on a tide of US media accusations to face a cloud of public appreciation.

‘It’s wonderful,’ he said, ‘there have been two months, very difficult.’

It was the first time he has sung the role in Vienna.

Comments

  • Bogda says:

    Domingo actually sang the role in Vienna in 2016, though in Theater an der Wien.

  • Brian says:

    Surprising to see the group of the young women interviewed about 2:00 into the video. You’d kind of expect the older fans aren’t going to change their views about Domingo at this point but the 20-somethings are the very demographic that he tended to target.

    Good for the reporter here to at least ask the questions that need asking.

    • Claudio says:

      They are from Spain, one of the most sexist and misogynist countries in Europe, where a woman can be gang raped and the judge rules it was not rape, and where statistics about violence against women are an embarrassment compared to the rest of the EU. For young women who grew up in that society, what Domingo is accused of doing isn’t as bad as the levels of abuse they witness or experience regularly.

  • dinkrol says:

    Not in Vienna, but in Staatsoper.
    He sang this role in Vienna in 2016 in Theater an der Wien

  • LunchtimeOBoulez says:

    Choke on it, dungaree-wearers! Bravo, Placido!

    • Laurence says:

      “Dungaree-wearers”? Hate to tell you, but your inane stereotypes are outdated. Them kids call them “jeans” nowadays.

    • Kay Langford says:

      Who wears dungarees?
      Is English your second language?

      • LunchtimeOBoulez says:

        Folks are dumb where you come from,
        They ain’t had no learnin’!
        They love to share their iggerance
        In good-ol’ yankee belligerunce!

        Love from Europe, where we invented opera.

        • Anon says:

          Seriously. Dungaree wearers? You don’t have a frigging clue what people who support or don’t support Domingo wear.

          With love from this Yank in CONTINENTAL Europe who’s seen enough moronic Brits behaving badly on Ryan Air flights alone to last an entire lifetime. Kindly get off your high horse.

  • sycorax says:

    Well, who cares about a few harassed women in Vienna? Probably they wanted to become groped and followed by him and actually – they should have see it as a honour instead of complaining about!

    Reading something like that I can only quote the Jewish-German painter Max Liebermann: “Kinders, ich kann gar nicht so viel fressen wie ich hier kotzen möchte!”

  • sycorax says:

    PS: I sometimes would like to ask Marta Domingo when she’s sold her self respect and how much she got for it.

    • david hilton says:

      What an unkind comment. You actually seem to take pleasure in the unhappiness of others.

    • Sue Sonata Form says:

      It would be an interesting question, if you could predict the answer. You might find the answer less predictable than you imagine. It may not suit your personal views. I’m betting she feels the same way as the 1st Mrs. Paravotti, who did much the same thing with his, er, proteges. Try not to worry about it, though, because she doesn’t look like she’s suffering to me.

    • LunchtimeOBoulez says:

      At the same market where you sold yours ten years earlier, you embittered old woman.

  • sam says:

    God is less tolerant.

  • Cassandra says:

    Any Opera House, with their wits about them, should seize the opportunity to invite Mr Domingo in for a round of Butterfly; for us not to miss out on a Consul Sharpless to whom we might not have given much attention so far.

  • Kay Langford says:

    ” media accusations”?

    The media has not been sexually harassed or sexually molested.

    The accusations come from real live women.

  • Patrick Gillot says:

    The Vienna opera lovers shows rightly complete disregard for the American Bulls..t!

  • anon says:

    Twenty women have said that Domingo sexually harassed or assaulted them. There’s an irony in all those Austrians saying they are not going to judge Domingo unless there is a completed legal proceeding. It was the same with the Holocaust. They had nothing to say until after the Nuremberg Trials. How fair of them!

  • Bob Slinger says:

    So he grabbed a few titties in his younger years. Who hasn’t. Get over it. Many a women has grabbed my ass in the disco and I don’t cry about it 30 years later let alone feel traumatized about it. Yeeez. These women accusers are just out for some long sought after attention after a life time of no men giving them the attention they desired. Metoo gave them the opportunity and they took it like vultures.

    • George says:

      Not even. Most of the accusations are “he whispered at me” / “he called me late at night” / “he put his hand on my knee” / “he wanted a kiss”.

    • Karl says:

      The only allegation that he grabbed a woman was totally refuted. The make-up artist who was there did not corroborate. That didn’t stop the fake news AP from publishing it.

  • Charles says:

    None of this makes the allegations untrue.

  • Sam McElroy says:

    30 comments and counting about sex. Is nobody scandalised by the fact that an opera house of the culture and caliber of Vienna is hiring Placido Domingo to sing Macbeth, the most dramatic of dramatic Verdi baritone roles (with all that such a role demands)? Or is the art form itself no longer of any importance to this sex-and-gender-and-skin-color-obsessed community? Who is advocating for our art form? Domingo, the legendary tenor, needs to retire from singing because he is not a baritone. In any way, shape or form. Full stop. Hire Ludovic Tézier to sing Macbeth! He is out of this world…

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