Categories: uncategorized
Tags: singing, opera, performances
Date: 07 December 2008 01:25:22
On Wednesday I went up to see my absolute favourite opera company, Pinchgut Opera, perform their new show. I thorougly enjoyed every minute. There was a Swedish tenor that they had flown in to perform the role of David, Anders Dahlin, and he was mesmerising on stage. What a privilege for Australian audiences to hear that voice.
The story itself is the biblical story of Saul, David and Jonathan. Jonathan was played by the Australian soprano Sara Macliver (presumably it was a castrato when first performed?). The interpretation certainly played up the relationship with David and Jonathan and even has them kissing at one point which I thought was interesting. The set was beautiful, a ruined chateau with Caravaggio's David and Goliath as the backdrop. My favourite choir Cantillation is the chorus of this particular opera company and they were brilliant, as usual.
It's a bit sad that I wait all year for Pinchgut and the night seems to go so quickly.
Last night I performed in Mendelssohn's Elijah. It was a combined performance between the Canberra Choral Society and Oriana Chorale . The choir director was Australian counter-tenor Tobias Cole and the concert conductor was Brett Weymark. Tobias Cole is a very enthusiastic and hard-working choir director. Brett Weymark is a fantastic conductor, from the first rehearsal with us, I knew what he wanted. It was really a privilege to work with both of them. I had such a fantastic time. It was a really high quality performance with fantastic soloists from interstate and a great orchestra. I had the tiniest of tiny solos which was the 4th last thing in the whole concert and I found two particular notes a bit difficult so I developed a complex about them. I think I'm my own worst enemy sometimes when I come to analyse it but many people (including the soloists) congratulated me on my little bit so that was nice. I did feel special because from a choir of 60+, only two choir people had solos and I was one of them :) I hope I made the choir director proud.
At the after party, I managed to talk with Tobias Cole who said he would like to give me some singing lessons. I think that it would be really good for me having lessons from Tobias because I really like him as a person and performer so would really strive to do well and reach his approval. I also talked with Brett Weymark about auditioning for Cantillation (the choir from the David and Jonathan show) as he sings with them. He gave me some useful advice about that and said that if I really wanted to do it, I should just go for it. I think I would be okay vocally but maybe my musicianship might let me down. There might be the option to re-audition (apparently this depends on who auditions me in the first place) so if I didn't get in, hopefully I could fix a few things with some feedback.
Tonight I am performing in Britten's Ceremony of Carols.
I'm a bit exhausted.