Word: sopranos
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...length of the production takes it toll on both the audience and the cast; by Act III, countertenor Jeffrey Gall (Julius) was cracking, and soprano Mary Westbrook-Geha (Cornelia) looked like she would have been grateful for a throat lozenge. A fifth of the audience was missing, too. The ridiculous length of this show trips up many of Sellar's interesting staging and acting ideas; the cast is so intent on remembering their lines, hitting the notes, and getting the blocking right that they can only make a gesture at acting...
...Soprano Susan Larson, as the Naughty Nymphet of the Nile, carries off her dramatic duties with the most distinction, particularly when you consider the tough role, the skimpy costumes, and fact that Sellars makes Larson crawl on the ground blindfolded--still singing, mind you--for the first half of Act III. Her sex-kitten seduction of Caesar--complete with all-girl band and aerial entry--would have won her a juicy part in the Gold Diggers...
Others disagree. "It is an extraordinary-sounding hall," says Conductor Dennis Russell Davies. "I have the feeling it is more brilliant than it was in the past, but I mean it positively, a spectacularly brilliant orchestral sound." Soprano Benita Valente, who sang there before and after the renovations, calls it a "little brighter, but glorious." Violinist Isaac Stern, president of Carnegie Hall and one of the leaders in the fight to save it from demolition in 1960, says, "What you hear now is this golden wash of sound, and at the same time there is clarity...
...Zeffirelli's spacious La Boheme from 1981-82 and his Tosca, for which Rome was rebuilt, two seasons ago -- also have marooned their casts in movie sets. Presto: singing pygmies. Now comes this extravagant Fledermaus with singers who become a backup chorus to the brocade and the woodwork. Rosalinde (Soprano Kiri Te Kanawa) gets lost in the crowd during Orlofsky's drinking party in Act II, and the vengeful Dr. Falke (Baritone Michael Devlin) blends nicely with the patterned wallpaper and the potted ferns...
...heard, the melodic freshets and torrents of Strauss's score should always flow, but under Conductor Jeffrey Tate's charmless time beating, even the famous waltz proves resistible. Te Kanawa displays her shimmering voice to some advantage in the first act, then fades away. As the bubbly chambermaid Adele, Soprano Judith Blegen is unsure of pitch and unsteady of tone, while Baritone Hakan Hagegard inappropriately plays Eisenstein as a staggering buffoon...