Tender Is The Night

As though by tradition, second novels, like second children, could never seem to surpass the earth-shattering emotion one felt that came with the birth of the first. André Aciman's latest and second novel, Eight White Nights, sadly, validates this theory all too well. His début novel, Call Me by Your Name—a riveting romp through a torrid summer love by way of Proust—had critics and readers around the world reaching for superlatives rapturous enough to convey their admiration. Now, this author who is the unrivaled twenty-first century incarnation of Marcel, sets his sights on Dostoyevsky's snowy, and therefore white, Saint Petersburg, only his own tale takes place in New York during the last eight days of December, when the decay of the passing year is contrasted sharply against the cleansing promise of the coming year. The two night owls who roam NYC during unholy hours of the evening and early morning in search of paradise (disguised here in the form of Beethoven, Handel, Rohmer, among others) are Clara and the unnamed twenty-something narrator, who, at the very moment Clara "put out a hand and introduced herself," becomes instantly drawn to her, to her name, to her "voile-thin crimson shirt which she wore unbuttoned to her breastbone, the swell of skin as smooth and as forbidding as the diamond stud on her thin platinum necklace."

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These two souls—lonely, detached, aloof—are both in their twenties, but live a particular lifestyle that doesn't correlate at all to their ages. For one, both live in ritzy Manhattan; have wealthy older friends for another; (possibly) know a foreign language or two; can quote Henry Vaughan if a heightened moment demands it ("Last night I saw Eternity. . ."); and have an entourage of equally sophisticated friends with "uptown" names like Gretchen, Boris, Rachel and Lauren, the types of which who have nothing better to do, so it seems, than to sit through Rohmer and throw dinner parties that stifle with their pretentiousness rather than endear. Aciman's prose remains so incurably Proustian that it takes an extremely patient reader to digest a baroque procession of extravagantly prolonged sentences crammed with as many therefores, howevers, maybes and perhapses as a sentence is legally allowed. The story revolves in the span of only eight chapters but rather feels like the span of two lifetimes had already elapsed between night one and night three, for these eight nights, no matter how stylishly rendered, are filled to the brim with over-inflected, flowery prose that dampen climactic scenes and vignettes such as the sex scene that never occurs in night six or seven: ". . . just make me make trouble, make me do something, make me hurt you, Clara, and hurt me hard, because this staying put like two boats tied to a dock is like waiting decades on death row." A microscopic attention to detail and a general sense of repetition bombard the reader, all of which easily filled up the 360 pages or so allotted to him by his publisher, and all of which one must slog through, out of a sense of duty, for Aciman is immensely gifted, and who can, at will and through sheer force of talent, weave a tapestry of spellbinding language and concoct inspired declarations such as this one: ". . . I'll say it now, not because I've lost you, but I've lost you because I loved you, because I saw eternity with you. . ."

The only thing missing was an olive

Gaetano Donizetti's unfailingly charming, wonderfully boisterous L'elisir d'amore imported plenty of much-needed Tuscan sun to frigid Chicago Saturday night, as Giuseppe Filianoti (in his belated Lyric début), Nicole Cabell, Alessandro Corbelli, and the rest treated a hibernating, flu-ridden audience to some luscious and heartwarming Italianate singing not heard at Civic for some time; not since Aprile Millo's series of red hot Toscas here did I "hear" and "see" Italy so vividly. Filianoti—whose voice is the very sound of romantic longing—was the lovesick Nemorino. One could—and one would—listen to him toss a note in mid-air, suspend it for a moment or two, and bring it right back down to earth relatively unscathed. Most of the people in my row—if I read their minds correctly—seemed to want to bask in the splendor of his voice forever; an elderly lady sitting next to me actually said so, for to listen to it, if one can get past the oh-so-minor imperfections, is to glimpse not spring nor printemps, but primavera. "Una furtiva lagrima" throbbed with a young man's deepest yearning, eliciting rapturous first-time audience love unheard at Lyric in years. The man may hail from sun-scorched Calabria, but what I saw—through his picturesque, Ferruccio Tagliavini-esque timbre—was not that southernmost of Italian cities, but the sobering grandeur of Firenze. Why that man, clearly possessing in my opinion the most stunningly beautiful tenor heard today, does not have a recording contract, I simply cannot fathom! I think I shall have to go back for another helping of G-Fil, for this overflowing banquet of a feast celebrating every aspect of amore not only shows off the tenor's one-in-a-million voice and artistry but illuminates it sublimely.

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Cabell—whose rather placid career aboard a boat marooned within the confines of a modest bay, but ambitious enough to sail over into the more shimmering port that docks the enviable yachts of Gheorghiu, Fleming and Netrebko—was the evening's poised Adina, here disguised as a sun-kissed, mannequin-like gypsy in rich-peasant outfits that screamed: Umbria. Ms. Cabell was graceful, lithe, smart, and commanding, but her voice seemed at various points tentative when attempting to caress one of Donizetti's most alluring and sensual music; her top notes were executed well enough, but left one with the sense that these money notes were survived rather than mastered. Alas, her vocal palette is pretty limited as well. Cabell might profit in this department by asking A.G. for some of hers.

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Corbelli was a stout, robust, and brilliantly hilarious Dulcamara: who else could he have been?

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This production—as traditional as it gets, in a lovely bucolic setting and bathed with luminous lighting meant to evoke Italy's famed hill towns—is staged like an American sitcom: everyone barging in on everyone, unannounced. Simply brilliant! An inspired farce transpired every time Corbelli entered or exited. Filianoti and Cabell have good chemistry together, which is crucial if we are to believe their ardor for each other.

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Bruno Campanella conducted the orchestra as though he were a gondolier navigating his way across turbulent Adriatic waters.

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Just an afterthought: How could a tortured soul (I asked myself this as Giuseppe sang the darling cavatina that introduces the simple yet impassioned hero to us, the kind we love to root for) create such a light-hearted, life-affirming opera (brimming with youthful love) so atypical to his nature? Could this possibly be the same man who turned Lucia into the most hair-raisingly demented—next to Lady Macbeth—operatic heroine ever?

Veraaysmo: Renée-style

I don't know where to begin. Renée Fleming has rendered me speechless for one whole week. Me, silent? Not in a million years. I, who grew up in Ceauşescu's Romania, have never learned the meaning of the word. Until about a week ago.

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I had the misfortune of listening to an advance copy of Ms. Fleming's upcoming CD, unimaginatively titled Verismo (why not: "Blood and Guts," or even: "Renée sings Verismo" might have added more flair to the album's title, but never mind. . .). Listening to it nearly killed me. First off, the album's sedate cover strikes me as totally lacking in imagination. I expected La Fleming to pose à la Beverly Sills with snakes for hair and monstrous makeup. Instead, I was assaulted by a smiling, badly-gowned Renée. A recycled photo at that! Which is baffling, for isn't she "supposed to be" Decca's premier, best-selling, Grammy-winning house artist? So why did Decca all of a sudden become frugal with her? But this is beside the point. Her singing? Yes, I was just getting to that. Before I do so, I just want to throw this out there: I'm not doing this because I'm jealous of La Fleming--far, far, far be it from me to be envious of anybody named Renée. (Or Anna. Or Karita. Or Natalie for that matter.) I am merely venting out what's in my heart. All right, let's get this over with. Fleming's singing is utterly atrocious in verismo. Not even my favorite conductor, Marco Armiliato, could mask or dissimulate the fact how "wrong" her voice sounds. The quality of her voice, I must admit, remains lovely, if a tad bit syrupy and frothy, but this repertoire is simply wrong for her soprano, the cajoling timbre of which makes verismo sound like a Brahms lullaby. (Imagine in your ears Astrid Varnay recording a disc of flagrantly sweet Massenet arias: see what I mean?!) What's worse, her legions of fans (who, by the way, are never fans of mine) have been waxing upon her lavish praise; some of them are even comparing their beloved soprano to giants like Magda Olivero and Renato Scotto. They might as well compare an exquisite marquise-cut Tiffany solitaire to a factory made cubic zirconia one buys at JC Penney! Further, she has gotten into my territory without permission with her jazz-inflected, scoooops galore rendition of one of my signature roles, Magda from La Rondine--with my preferred boytoy of choice, Jonas Kaufmann, to boot! Listening to her sing the famous quartet with J. K. and the chorus--the one that my voice Puccini seemed to have in mind when he sat down to compose it--made me cringe in horror and disgust. She sings it as though she were belting out the hair-raising trio from Nabucco: the oddest sounds come out of her mouth, like she's from another species, like Ghena Dimitrova inhaled helium or something. I must say that she retains a strong technique from time to time, and is able to produce moments of pure rapture, at will, whenever she finds it necessary to caramelize a phrase, but as an artist she says absolutely nothing with her instrument. Where's the anguish? the despair? the frustration and longing she is supposed to be conveying in gems like Zaza's gut-wrenching finale, or Mimi's pair of soaringly beautiful arias? Her singing is devoid of a real and authentic emotion that one expects from this red-hot music. She has virtually no understanding of what really goes on inside the hearts and minds of these brave heroines she has misguidedly chosen to tackle. Violence, crime, starvation, unrequited love, et al., are main ingredients of the boiling stew that is verismo. On several occasions on this CD, she sounds as though she is about to break into Manon's jovial, innocent Gavotte any minute. Verismo singing must be suffused with a sexual glow: Fleming is neither sensual nor voraciously sexual (like me)--on or off the stage. For me, she has always been mortifyingly dowdy. It even trickles down into her singing. May I remind her, too, that a yelp, a scoop, a most annoying howling effect that hopes to masquerade as terror DO NOT, for a blink of an eye, make for a compelling characterization. It accomplishes nothing, yet only adds to the stigma that opera is fake and silly and preposterous.

L'amour non partagé

Abraham Cowley:

A mighty pain to love it is. . .

But of all pains, the greatest pain

Is to love, but love in vain.

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James Matthew Barrie:

Let no one who loves be called unhappy.

Even love unreturned has its rainbow.

27 is the new. . . 27

Twenty-seven is such a beautiful, elegant, attractive number; an odd number that is anything but odd. It seems to insinuate itself into my life for some strange, mysterious reason. As a matter of fact this "number" is staring at me as I type. It looks good on a cake. It is the number that rules all. . . . that, or I'm just plain deluded. What do you think? Read below. . .

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One summer, to my heart's utter delight and joy, I read 27 novels: every day, every afternoon, every night, every waking moment of my existence that summer was spent on reading the classics new and old: Sons and Lovers; Jude The Obscure; A Ship Made Of Paper; Portrait Of A Lady—among the greatest masterpieces of the language. The next summer, on a fishing trip, I helped catch 27 big ones, after what felt like 27 hours of waiting and waiting on that boat, floating around Lake Michigan's choppy waters à la Tallulah Bankhead in Hitchcock's Lifeboat. There are 27 books in the New Testament. Arithmetically speaking, in a prime reciprocal magic square of the multiples of 1/7, the magic constant is 27. (According to Wikipedia.) Scientifically, the Chemical Element Cobalt has an atomic number of 27. The planet Uranus has 27 moons. In the year 27 AD, apricots were brought to Rome from Asia. The same year, the Chinese philosopher Wang Chong was born. (According to my oldest friend; himself born on the 27th of September, the 270th day of the year.) Materially, I own 27 pairs of jeans in every possible shade. Artistically, Kandinsky's 1912 masterpiece, The Garden of Love, which hangs at the Metropolitan Museum, is also known as Improvisation No. 27. Musically, I own 27 renditions of Violetta's first act showstopper, "Sempre libera," that I downloaded the autumn I discovered the profound, deeply penetrating beauty of La Traviata. Mozart—the greatest composer in history, bar none—completed a grand total of—count 'em—27 concerti for piano and orchestra; himself born on the 27th of the first month of 1756. Verdi, the greatest Italian operatic composer of all time, wrote 27 hair-raising operas; my all-time favorite Traviata is one of them. I've seen Angela's La Scala Traviata DVD a whopping 27 times in the last three months. On a personal note, my mother was at the most ideal age of 27 when she gave birth to me, after what seemed (according to her) like 27 straight days of intense, earth-shattering labor. . . . twenty-seven years ago; or, to be more precise, 27 May thirty-firsts ago this very day. Odd, for I essentially feel I've lived only half of those 27 years, which reduces me down to 13.5 years old. Nah, who wants to be a teenager again! 27 is much better: a beautiful, elegant, attractive number.

The Dress That Started It All

A gourmet cookie induced Marcel Proust to discover his infamous "madeleine". Mine was a shimmering dress that my mother wore so memorably to a wedding in 1987 for which I stood as ring bearer, and she as the First Reader. Whose nuptial it was, I forget; yet the vivid memory of that dress burns brighter than ever, indelibly stamped in my mind. Every aspect of the dress, every delicate ruffle, where it was purchased, every seam of that dangerously haughty and "so-eighties!" frock, all feels as if it were worn by my mother only yesterday. Time may have elapsed and poked tiny holes through the silken fabric, but my recollection of it has never waned nor tarnished in any way. I can still recall, twenty-one years later, when my mother and I ventured out on an unusually warm, practically tropical, December evening to buy that dress. I remember how impatient I grew as any kid would when his mother has tried on every dress on the rack, figuring out the possibilities, every variation, every color scheme, Would this enhance my skin tone?, as if she were debating to buy a house and lot. Then, finally, she put on the dress and when she came out of the dressing room to make her grand entrance, I was floored. I marveled, with jaws dropped to the floor, at the frou-frouness of the dress. If only I knew, then, the impact that night would have on me, a dress which for over two decades has quenched and satisfied my greatest fashion longings. It was a truly life-altering moment. Like a person who has witnessed an apparition as a child in a forest somewhere, the vision and memory of that spellbinding dress on my mother has haunted and enriched my imagination and is solely responsible for forming the seeds of my childhood dreams and aspirations.

How profound and bold an impact that Carmen-inspired dress has had on my perception of fashion, too. A creation which is the epitome of 80's excess of the most opulent kind: An ankle-length, bracelet-sleeved dress cut in black and silver textured satin with a whimsical print that suggested the amusing characters of the commedia dell'arte, and featuring a drop-waist
reminiscent of the 20's, further emphasized by a sash in lipstick-red chiffon ~ but that is not all ~ the skirt portion of the dress was gathered abundantly at the hips so that it would flounce and flutter, flaunting into a three-tiered ruffle, which seemed to scream "Ole!" whenever my mother walked and sashayed and danced in it. It was truly a dress on the edge of creativity. It is incomprehensible to fathom how a couture-copied dress from way back in my history could still have the alluring power to haunt me in my dreams or whenever I see a production of Carmen, or see a replica of it, inducing me to fondly reminisce of my growing up years, one that was infected with an incurable obsession with the art of fashion and of dressing. Gratefully, I was born into a family that even though far from being extremely well-off, took the business of style with passion and with elegance, but above all, with dignity. The women in my family, which outnumbers the men, by the way ~ my mother bien-sur, my aunts, my female cousins ~ all fostered my obvious fascination with fashion from a very young age, happily and willingly going against the grain by buying me fashion magazines, even when boys my own age were preoccupied with Matchboxes and toy soldiers. That dress is still in my mother's possession after all this time, stored like a museum artifact in one of the many closets that house her clothes, documenting her many fashion "eras" for when she was sizes 4, 6, 8, 12, and up to the healthy secret size that she is now.

It is like a particularly unforgettable scent that could harken and bring the past back to vivid life in the slightest provocation. It will remain to reside in my memory, and in the closet, hanging there on a silk-covered hanger no less. Sometimes, when I think about it, I could almost smell it reeking of Lolita Lempicka, the perfume my mother was using at the time. Though outmoded in every sense, it is still as vibrant and full of life as ever, and beautiful and timeless, like a bird poised for flight, ready to take off in any minute. Staring at it today and stroking the silken fabric opened the floodgates of memory. It is the enchanting madeleine of my childhood. In summation, I think I was definitely born with a voracious lust and love for fashion, which along with my slavish devotion to music and art, I thank wholeheartedly whatever magical potion or enchanted fruit my mother ate during the course of her pregnancy with me, everyday of my life, always, and perhaps forever.

.... And suddenly the memory revealed itself. The taste was that of the little piece of madeleine which on Sunday mornings at Combray (because on those mornings I did not go out before mass), when I went to say good morning to her in her bedroom , my aunt Léonie used to give me, dipping it first in her own cup of tea or tisane. The sight of the little madeleine had recalled nothing to my mind before I tasted it; perhaps because I had so often seen such things in the meantime, without tasting them, on the trays in pastry-cooks' windows, that their image had dissociated itself from those Combray days to take its place among others more recent; perhaps because of those memories, so long abandoned and put out of mind, nothing now survived, everything was scattered; the shapes of things, including that of the little scallop-shell of pastry, so richly sensual under its severe, religious folds, were either obliterated or had been so long dormant as to have lost the power of expansion which would have allowed them to resume their place in my consciousness. But when from a long-distant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, taste and smell alone, more fragile but more enduring, more unsubstantial, more persistent, more faithful, remain poised a long time, like souls, remembering, waiting, hoping, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unflinchingly, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structure of recollection. ~Remembrance of Things Past. Volume 1: Swann's Way: Within a Budding Grove.

Die Frau: Voigt/Brewer Showdown

Where is Birgit Nilsson when you need her?

Generally speaking, Lyric's new production of Die Frau ohne Schatten is Cirque du Soleil meets Rent with just a hint of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. The lighting design conjures up a burlesque show or a dazzling revue at the Lido; in the first Act, there were giant dye pots filled with neon colors which evoked exotic countries like Pakistan or Syria. They were baffling yet oddly eye-catching. As for the opera itself, well, it's all just so silly, really. Filled with a myriad of symbolisms that I don't really care to decipher; the music I'm told is supposed to be "more stirring" than Salome and "charming" than Der Rosenkavalier. I beg to differ. This production is definitely eye-candy, just a tad bit too eye-candy. Not to mention hokey. I found myself half-expecting Josephine Baker to swing down from the ceiling in her banana skirt. I also found myself increasingly stirred by the uncoventional beauty of Lyric débutante Cristine's Brewer's voice. I found myself wishing in vain all evening that she was singing the Empress.

Deborah Voigt's reputation as a formidable soprano, one who specializes in Strauss has been dubbed celestial and otherworldly, lustrous and orgasmic. But like a person tossing and turning in bed, trying to find the best position, I had a hard time searching something in her soprano that remotely conjured up the satisfaction or reception of beautiful singing. It goes without saying that her tone is rich and lush; her timbre, however, is one that does not bloom; it lacks color, if I may be so blunt. Ms. Brewer's voice, meanwhile, was ravishing last night as the Dyer's wife, at several instances, it forced my eyes closed. The timbre of her voice, a strata of silk with intricate beading; the tone, light as chiffon, and fluid as charmeuse is most perfect for the music of the Empress or any other Strauss heroine you care to name. Voigt's Empress was mere flurries to Brewer's blizzard of a Dyer's wife. Listening to Ms. Voigt's colorless soprano, it made me long all over again for Angela's timbre. If the color of Gheorghiu's voice evokes Rome at dusk, Voigt's resembled Seville in the scorching heat of the midday sun: Glaring, blinding, and at times, painful to take all in. She looks ravishing, though. Franz Hawlata, Jill Grove and Robert Dean Smith complete the solid cast. Paul Curran is the director. This opera is the type of opera Andrew Davis ought to conduct more often, instead of Puccini. In this Frau, the orchestra was thrilling and vivacious, ravishing and atmospheric. If only the soprano who sang the "shadowless woman" sounded that way.

The Violetta Mystique

I had a dream about Violetta Valery last night. I'm not exactly sure how or why. But perhaps listening to four different recordings of La traviata- Callas, Moffo, Cotrubas, and Gheorghiu- in the last month, triggered something. So, who was the Violetta of my dreams? I forget. (Why do dreams quickly fade?) But she certainly had the melancholic tone of Callas and most definitely Gheorghiu's darkest hue. In this rather vague dream, it got me thinking. No heroine in the entire operatic repertoire is more beloved and feared than Ms. Valery. Not even Tosca, the Countess or Cio-Cio San for that matter, can equal the irresistable allure and conviction of this tragic courtesan with the heart of gold. Part of her charm lies in the fact that she is totally believable. Interestingly enough, most women today still relate to her sad predicament. How many operatic characters can you say that about?