Today I could not go to the Met simulcast of Nico Muhly's new opera.
After listening again to his Two Boys the technical issues were to much for me--I knew I would walk out of the performance of Marnie.
The vocal lines in Two Boys neither lead or follow and exist only as as heterophonic space to declame the text. The story falls flat.
Two Boys has some first rate instrumental music but that too is a problem. I kept thinking the vocal parts should switch with the instrumental parts or at least be part of that instrumental texture.
It's not just because underscoring is an instrumental technique and opera is a lyric one, but because his vocal models; that is Glass and Adams, have never had the same success telling traditional opera stories as with their Tableau. A static tableau is not just different from a traditional operatic setting of, for example, a commercial mystery novel, but the audience expectation of the results is also different. The expectation is grand opera. Also Glass and Adams are successful because of what they are not (serialists)-not because of what they are. Hating serial music is not enough anymore.
I also wanted to go because of the reviews I read which I feel do a disservice to the composer-- faint praise and faint damnation as well. Even the usually reliable New Yorker found time to talk about many things other than Nico's music.
When you start at the top what inducement would their be to improve your technique? Obviously only those folks who can provide performances have opinions that matter.
I will catch this on the MET on line when It gets there.
After listening again to his Two Boys the technical issues were to much for me--I knew I would walk out of the performance of Marnie.
The vocal lines in Two Boys neither lead or follow and exist only as as heterophonic space to declame the text. The story falls flat.
Two Boys has some first rate instrumental music but that too is a problem. I kept thinking the vocal parts should switch with the instrumental parts or at least be part of that instrumental texture.
It's not just because underscoring is an instrumental technique and opera is a lyric one, but because his vocal models; that is Glass and Adams, have never had the same success telling traditional opera stories as with their Tableau. A static tableau is not just different from a traditional operatic setting of, for example, a commercial mystery novel, but the audience expectation of the results is also different. The expectation is grand opera. Also Glass and Adams are successful because of what they are not (serialists)-not because of what they are. Hating serial music is not enough anymore.
I also wanted to go because of the reviews I read which I feel do a disservice to the composer-- faint praise and faint damnation as well. Even the usually reliable New Yorker found time to talk about many things other than Nico's music.
When you start at the top what inducement would their be to improve your technique? Obviously only those folks who can provide performances have opinions that matter.
I will catch this on the MET on line when It gets there.
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