Night After Night

Writing, a blog, and a newsletter. By Steve Smith.

Adult education.

Midori and Robert McDonald at Avery Fisher Hall
The New York Times, April 26, 2007

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I seldom add remarks and enable comments when I post my Times reviews, but just this once I’ll make an exception. Before a last-minute swerve found me at Avery Fisher Hall for the Midori recital — which I didn’t regret a bit, mind you — I’d intended to catch the Metropolitan Opera’s Giulio Cesare on Tuesday night with its new cast members: Lawrence Zazzo in the title role, Jill Grove as Cornelia and most especially Danielle de Niese as Cleopatra. (I’d also originally hoped to catch a performance by the first cast with David Daniels, Patricia Bardon and Ruth Ann Swenson in those roles, but settled for listening to last Saturday’s Met broadcast through ear-buds while I traipsed around the Philadelphia Zoo.)

My interest in Tuesday night’s performance mostly had to do with De Niese, whose gorgeous singing and sinuous, Bollywood-inspired dance moves in the recent Glyndebourne Guilio Cesare had so won me over on DVD. That production arrives at the Lyric Opera of Chicago in November (details here), and I’m very much hoping to make a trip to see it. So after the Midori concert, I headed over to the Met lobby, arriving just in time to watch De Niese deliver what appeared to be a show-stopping rendition of the Act II lament "Se pietà di me non senti" on one of those now-omnipresent flat-screen monitors.

What I heard might not have been quite so crushingly detailed as Magdalena Kožená’s account in the Minkowski recording included in the playlist of the post that preceded this one. But even via a single-camera broadcast on a monitor in a lobby, this very nearly reduced me to tears. (Granted, Handel deserves at least some of the credit.)

So, to anyone who might have been in the house on Tuesday night: Was De Niese’s performance as strong in person as it seemed on video?

Steve Smith

5 responses to “Adult education.”

  1. andrew Avatar
    andrew

    Its funny because we thought her Act II lament was her weakest moment. Her Act III was great. Seemed to us she got quivery or something late in Act II. But the woman is only in her 20s and I think there’s the making of a fine singer. She certainly takes charge of the stage. And she certainly seemed to be having a good time. Alice Coote was also terrific. Musically the evening seemed solid but nothing hit the height of Blythe and Daniels in the previous revival.
    By the way, your comments on the Philadelphia Orchestra concert Saturday night exactly mirrored our reactions to both that concert and the St Louis concert. You need to go back to Verizon and hear Philadelphia play for Rattle or, now especially, Jurowski. Both seem to be conductors they have special connections with. And when either conduct you actually hear the fabled Philadelphia Sound. You dont hear it with Eschenbach.

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  2. Susan Avatar
    Susan

    When De Niese made her debut as Barbarina in that dream team Nozze of 1998 I thought she had really exciting potential. But Tuesday she sounded strained and shrill. She’s gorgeous on stage and has wonderful theatrical and musical instincts — her Cleopatra had much more dimension than Swenson’s vocally superior interpretation. De Niese’s voice still holds the promise of a rich lyric instrument which won’t be realized if she continues like this. Bad idea to sing Cleopatra till your technique is solid!

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  3. Steve Smith Avatar
    Steve Smith

    Andrew and Susan, thanks very much indeed for these insights.

    Reply
  4. Michael Avatar
    Michael

    She might have sounded a bit strained at the first performance. She was just coming off of a strep-throat infection and had had a fever of 103 or so for a number of days before the show. I saw her backstage after the performance that night and she was pretty wiped out. I was actually impressed at how much she still had to give in that condition. She definitely had more ease during her final performance a few days later.

    Reply
  5. nic Avatar
    nic

    I have had the pleasure of seeing Ms.De Niese in a school production at the Mannes College when i was also attending the school.She was great in it..Very promising talent.The voice a the time in one word beautiful…Although she did have alot of work to do in the voice..SHe posessed the materail to work with..I had the pleasure of seeing her later on some yrs at a recital and it was not that great.The voice was shrill and had an edge which it did not have..Too bad though she is a great talent one that could have been at the level of Renee Fleming…well..too late now…In my opinion,She started to become famous by doing these high profile performances before her technique was solid…What a waste…Hopefully she can pull it together and salvage that voice..As soon as possible..otherwise..as all singers in the classical world know..if you don’t attend to the problems of the voice now..through time it will be too late to fix..Good luck to her though..she always seemed very ammbitious and smart to me…..so maybe it is not too late..

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