NOT THESE
BUT THESE
Pavarotti - King of the high Cs
Well I had a bit of a cultural weekend in Auckland managing to cram in NZ Opera's The Barber of Seville, Ron Howard's documentary film on Luciano Pavarotti and Indri Hughes organ recital at the town hall. Marvellous and would have been perfect if I'd managed to see Delicious Oblivion at the Cabaret Festival but just missed out.
The Barber of Seville was a lot of fun. This is comedy-opera but it wasn't fluffy as the performances were really good and the set outstanding making lots of use of opening balconies and upstairs/downstairs antics. It was good to see the NZ cast matching it well with the Aussis. Great stuff. NZ Opera always put on a good show.
Sunday morning
Ron Howard's documentary on the life of Luciano Pavarotti is a 'must see'.
Sure, some reviewers will write scathing reviews saying that the 'homage' is a bit too gentle and twee but Howard manages to keep himself and opinions out of this and just shows Pavarotti doing what he did best - singing. The poor life choices were mentioned and shown but not dwelt on as these things should be. This will bring tears to your eyes in parts and those 'high Cs' - outstanding.
Sunday afternoon
The Auckland council put on free concerts at the town hall from time to time and on Sunday afternoon we were lucky to catch this beauty. 'Free' means by donation which we gave $10 each knowing that proceeds go to the preservation society for the wonderful and world famous Auckland Town Hall organ. Hughes played this 'machine' brilliantly mixing up Bach, Vivaldi and Handel classics with some lighter British pastoral tunes. He played a very moving dedication to a recently bereaved friend with two Elgar pieces.
They set up the hall well with a big screen either side of the organ, one showing the foot pedals and the other the keyboards and the stops.
We really enjoyed this and will look forward to future concerts.
I'm sorry that I missed out on Delicious Oblivion though.
This was Jennifer Ward-Lealand take on the songs from the nightclubs of Berlin during the days of Weimar Republic including Kurt Weill classics.
Maybe it'll get a repeat sometime and I'll keep a better eye on what's on on Auckland.
Organ concerts just don't do it for me. I don't know why. Maybe because it looks like someone playing a wall.
ReplyDeleteYes it looked funny. The organist kind of threw himself about a bit and it looked manic like something out of Monty Python. The big screens helped and showed the intricacies of the keyboards, the stops and the pedals.
ReplyDeleteHis Elgar Nimrod was sublime.
I wish I knew who Elgar Nimrod was / is.
ReplyDeleteElgar - Nimrod (from "Enigma Variations")
ReplyDeleteObtuse must be your middle name.
I always imagined the Cultured Curmudgeon was a different person but I now understand he and The Curmudgeon are one.
ReplyDeleteNo, why would you think that?
ReplyDeleteI thought you believed in some trinity thing of three jokers in one.
With me it's eighteen in one.