Into the Light Blue Yonder with The Little Chinese Man

Somehow I felt him coming. Having just returned from Chicago where the heat ensnared me, the city enraptured me and a certain brunette with an indeterminate accent interrogated me I knew I was due for my luck to run out.

My shit-served-straight-up day started as soon as I took the first call and listened as two people who were supposed to know something feigned corporate indignation in a raspberry-hued tone, trying to cover up they didn't know shit. From there it was an easy slide down the chute into the hopelessness and despair that stains so much of the existence of my 8-5. As I left the building I knew he'd be out there. It didn't matter what route I took- he would find me.

I decided to make farfalle and meat stew for dinner, so I went up Post Street with the intention of cutting over at Jones to go the Halal butcher on Geary. At Post and Stockton I espied Axel Feldheim, my friend and another man I tend to run into unexpectedly but frequently in this tiny town. Axel and I chatted on the corner- he was on his way to the Mechanics Library for a lecture on how people like us were Fifth Columnists. As we spoke, suddenly, ten feet away, he minced toward me- the Little Chinese Man was right there.

I gasped. I probably squealed. "It's the Little Chinese Man!" Axel looked at me like I had just dropped my pants in the street.

"I need to take his picture."

I pulled my phone out of my pocket. My hands trembled as I found the camera setting. Using Axel as a human shield, I stepped out into the middle of the sidewalk to bring him down. Then, in a moment of a premature excitement I haven't experienced since Lana Mardian, I misfired completely.

I hit the wrong button. My photo opp of the little Chinese Man failed. Damn, I said to myself.

Alarmed, Axel said "What are you doing?"

"Didn't you know? Didn't you read about him?"

"No, I need to catch up," he said.

"He's following me. I see him everywhere!"

"Who?"

Pointing to the tight, light-blue dungarees now behind me, with the short beige jacket on top- "Him! The Little Chinese Man!"

LCM had now stopped at the corner, amidst a throng of shoppers. Briefly he turned to offer me his profile, but again I missed the pay-off. I snapped the picture only to get his backside. The light turned green, he minced out into the crosswalk, gone- the outline of his tight briefs against his Little Chinese Man buns seared into my brain like two girls, one cup. Irreversible.

I felt emasculated. Axel took leave of me. He'll probably never talk to me again. I made my way up Post, took a left on Jones, scanning the street from left to right all the way, thinking he'd be back- knowing he's taunting me.

I entered the butcher shop and ordered my fresh meat. A pound of it. Then I crossed the street to get my peppers, which were battered, bruised and soft so I settled for tomatoes. It's been that kind of day. As I made my way home I kept an eye peeled for him, feeling as if I was suddenly a character in an Orson Wells movie. He eluded me this time. But I'll get him. I'm good at the hunt and the hunt is on.

He's dead center in the picture.

In Chicago

In Chicago with a Manhattan:


In the summertime, in Grant Park:

In the Moulin Rouge:

Included for Patrick:

In praise of a roomful of Richters in the Art Institute:

In the House for Another Fanciulla

CC and I caught tonight's performance of San Francisco Opera's La Fanciulla Del West from our usual orchestra seats and there were some noticeable differences in what I heard from last week's performance, attended in the balcony. At the first intermission we ran into Jim, whose encyclopedic knowledge and experience are always a delight, and he was sitting quite closer to the stage than we were. Jim thought Deborah Voigt was not as familiar with the role as she should be, since she was constantly looking at Luisotti for either help or cues. As the night progressed, having heard it before, I began to doubt this was the case. I suspect Voigt was looking Luisotti thinking "turn it down, how am I supposed to sing over this?" because I have never heard the SFO orchestra play louder than they had this evening.

My impression, largely gleaned from the previous performance and a knowledge of Voigt's professionalism, comes from hearing the orchestra repeatedly go way over all the singers in tonight's performance. Maybe the difference is in the acoustics between the balcony and the orchestra, but I've sat in this hall enough to doubt it. Tonight it was loud- too loud for Puccini. It was Wozzeck-level loud, which one doesn't need for this kind of music, but is great for Berg. Even Timothy Mix was buried in Luisotti's wall of sound.

Other observations- maybe someone read my previous post, because Licitra and Voigt seemed to make more of an effort at the "chemistry" so lacking in last week's performance; Licitra has a great voice, but a minimal amount of stage presence; Sherriff Jack is probably the most poorly-developed character in an opera ever- not bad enough to hate like Scarpia, not sympathetic enough to even consider he may have a shred of decency ala Pinkerton- fail.

The music of the second act sounds so far ahead of its time. This is the foundation for soundtracks to almost every Western made in Hollywood for the next fifty years and it's pretty mind-blowing to hear how much this score influenced Copland and the multitudes who scored AFI's list of the best Westerns ever made. The seeds for all of those soundtracks are found here, written in 1910 by an Italian. Amazing when you really think about it, which I obviously am. The core of what came to be known as the soundtrack of the American West, so deeply rooted in the consciousness of North Americans- courtesy of Puccini?

The horse didn't work for me the second time around, either.

And to the usher who told CC she had to put her gummy bears away as we were walking back to our seats- was that really necessary?

In the Back Corner of a Speakeasy

Bourbon and Branch has been in my neighborhood for a few years now and much to my surprise they've been able to maintain the same strict house rules and reservation/time limit policy in place since they opened. These same rules and policies keep me from going very often because while I appreciate the novelty (and quiet) I generally don't like rules. I especially don't like rules when I'm drinking.

However on Tuesday I found myself there with 5 other wonderful folks to celebrate MAP's birthday and I was reminded of how great their drinks really are. I had a Liberal and was tempted to order another but had a something Louisiana instead that was almost as delicious. The Liberal, however, was sublime. Many Sazeracs were consumed, all of them expertly made- and I am a very picky Sazerac drinker. Also tasty were the Saint Germain and the Ramos Gin Fizz, which was not on the menu but willingly provided.

While I smirk at the pretensions behind this and other "cocktail forward" bars (I am not making the term up- this is how our server described Rickhouse, also owned by the folks), the drinks are damn fine- and worth the price, though they certainly ain't cheap.

Yes, the photo is of The Liberal (foreground) and The Saint Germaine. I broke the rule against taking pictures. If Bourbon and Branch relaxed all of the rules except the cell phone ban, I'd probably drink here a lot more often than I do. So maybe they should leave them in place. I already like bourbon way too much as it is. Notice my choice of words here? Yes, I said I like bourbon way too much. I did not say I drink bourbon way too much. Nor do I drink way too much of what I like. What I meant to say is I like to drink way too much Bourbon. And there we are.

Regardless, stay away on the weekends, especially after after midnight, when the place, especially the library, always seems to be taken over by trendy type douches who are as obnoxious as the crackhead douches outside, taking the whole thing (and themselves) way too seriously. Early on a Tuesday is good- when we got there it was quiet, and though the place was almost full when we left two hours later, it remained easy for all of us to talk in our nice dark corner booth.

In Pursuit of the Little Chinese Man

It began about 6 or 7 years ago. My friends and I would meet at Hurgadah on Hyde for coffees and breakfast on Saturday morning back in that brief time when we all lived within walking distance of one another. We'd be sitting there, enjoying ourselves, and then suddenly he would walk by. He seemed to zero in on me- my friends affirmed this- it wasn't my imagination. He has such a distinct appearance one really can't mistake him for anyone else. Picture the love child of Alan Cumming and the Area 53 Alien, born somewhere in a Chinese hinterland. I call him The Little Chinese Man.

The Little Chinese Man has been following me around San Francisco for years now and his appearances are growing more frequent. Now this is a small town, where you will see everyone, and I do mean everyone, you've ever met, drank with, slept with and antagonized again. It may take years, but it will happen. This is something different. This is a haunting. This is a hunt. I see him on my street sometimes. My job recently relocated to an entirely different part of downtown and I rarely take the same route home on a regular basis and yet there he is. Coming toward me. He's like the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

Except of course he's not. He's so slim and pale it's startling. His pants, always too short, and very tight around his junk, are always clean and pressed. He often wears a little jacket that never goes beyond the waist. He minces. His face has an expression that seems to be a perpetual pucker but it betrays nothing beyond a vague, sinister hunger. I see him everywhere. Including on the street where I live. I guess I have seen him at least 60 times now. Only once was he standing still, talking into a cell phone with obvious angst at the Galleria outside the Ralph Lauren store.

When I spot him, and I am a safe distance away, I usually send a text to my friend the Reverend Brown, identifying the location, who can only laugh at this urban hunt. The thread now has 51 entries...It has been suggested that I go up to him and introduce myself. Maybe that would break the cycle. I don't think I can do it.

Today I saw him at Market and Montgomery- a corner new to our long and ever-increasing list of chance (?) encounters and I knew I needed to take his picture. I started to follow him but he quickly vanished as if he had eyes in the back of his head and sensed my pursuit. Then from a great distance I saw him and snapped this photograph. Real evidence of what? My spectre? A doppelganger? Who is he and what does he want with me?

I'm on a mission now. I will get a photograph of the Little Chinese Man and I will share it and someone will tell me about him. Who he is and if he has a trust fund.



He's not the figure in blue- that's some woman who got in front of him. No, he's just beyond her- that slight, barely perceptible, quickly fading from view mincing man who can't weigh more than 100 lbs. He may just be the scariest man alive.

Stay tuned.

In the Golden West

San Francisco Opera's current production of Puccini's La Fanciulla Del West ("The Girl of the Golden West") is a surprising success. Don't let SFO's sophomoric and moronic marketing of this as "The Original Spaghetti Western" put you off- there is some operatic gold being mined in this production, courtesy of a strong cast, well-designed sets by Maurizio Balo (this is a co-production with Teatro Massimo Palermo and Opera Royal de Wallonie) and superb conducting of the SFO orchestra under music director Nicola Luisotti. It also doesn't hurt that although Fanciulla is the least-performed of any of the composers major works, it just may be his richest score. It doesn't have any show-stopping arias like those found in Tosca, Boheme, Butterfly or Turandot, but musically, this is Puccini at his best and Luisotti led the orchestra through a flawless performance of the score.

Onstage things were pretty fine as well. Act 1 opens with a tavern called the Polka being assembled onstage while various miners mill about singing this and that and it's all fine and good though on this particular night I thought the chorus was weak and a bit of a hash. Deborah Voigt, singing the role for the first time, enters by firing a pistol three times and with her white-blonde wig and red leather get-up, immediately becomes the beating heart of the show. I'll admit to being a Voigt partisan and while I may not want to watch her as Salome at this point in her career, I'd happily listen to her anytime. The constant chatter about the quality of her voice over the last few years is just annoying to me. Voigt can still sing- and she sings very well. She's also one of the better actresses appearing on opera stages. Minnie suits her- Voigt has a tremendous personal warmth when you meet her that is genuine and this role calls for that same warmth to make it believable. The score doesn't give Minnie any big arias even though she's the central character, odd for Puccini, but in place of that are three acts of melodic beauty which Voigt executes with clarity and precision.


Salvatore Licitra, making his first appearance with SFO (finally!) has also taken a beating since bursting into the opera world's consciousness when he filled in for Pavarotti at the Met a few years back and hit it out of the park. This was my first time hearing him and he sounds like an Italian singer should- which is to say he reminded me of a younger Pavarotti, something one doesn't encounter much these days. He has a rich, full voice and his performance was vocally magnificent as bad boy Dick Johnson.

Oddly however, he and Voigt have zero chemistry together onstage and this becomes a distraction by the end, where they ride off into the sunset together while holding hands at the greatest distance possible. I can't believe this is called for by stage director Lorenzo Mariani, so if anyone has any backstage dirt on this, feel free to leave it in the comments.

Roberto Frontali fared less well as Sheriff Jack Vance but not because he couldn't sing well, which he can- he just doesn't look comfortable with the role. This may or may not be his fault as the Sheriff's role isn't quite rendered correctly in the libretto. He's not a bad guy, but he is a jerk, and as the third side of a love-triangle it just doesn't work.

The supporting roles were well-sung, with two singers making notable impressions: first, Timothy Mix's Sonora was a tremendous success. This is his first time at SFO and he'll be back again in the fall in Cyrano, which I'm sitting on the fence about seeing. I hope Gockley has the good sense to bring him back regularly.

Second, although she only sings for about a minute and a half, current Adler fellow Maya Lahyani's voice filled the house and is quite impressive for such a young singer at this point in her career. As I mentioned previously, I think she has the goods to be the next Netrebko. I know, that's complete hyperbole, but when she's famous ala Netrebko maybe she'll remember I was an early advocate for her and she'll get me really good seats for her inevitable Met debut and an interview for this blog. I really, really want to see her as Carmen.

A last note on the horse: I was disappointed the horse was led by two handlers when it makes its entrance. It kills the effect and makes it a bit of silly staging. And unfortunately, the horse didn't live up to its name.

See this one and listen closely- it's well worth it.

Production photos by Cory Weaver, lifted from SFO's website.

In the Ring, with the Times

The coverage of LA Opera's Ring at the LA times has really been exceptional. Not only has classical music/opera critic Mark Swed been a highly visible presence online, but the Times has also sent theater and pop music critics to cover it from a different perspective. As someone who appreciates pop and rock as well as opera, classical and other forms of music, I have been impressed by the postings of Ann Powers, who usually writes the Pop and Hiss blog (part of the larger Culture Monster blog found on the Times' website). She gets it- and articulates it very well, even if I sometimes disagree with her choice of analogies.

I'm linking to all four of her reviews of the second cycle. The third one is about to begin- again, if you can, I urge you to take a trip to LA and see at least a part of it if not the entire thing. It's phenomenal and last time I looked you could get tickets for individual performances on Goldstar, which is sad for the company but great for the average Joe or Josephine. In the meantime, take a look at these:

Das Rheingold: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2010/06/a-pop-music-critic-takes-on-wagners-ring-cycle-das-rheingold.html

Die Walkure: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2010/06/a-pop-critic-takes-on-the-ring-of-valkyries-and-vocal-magnificence.html

Siegfried: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2010/06/a-pop-critic-takes-on-the-ring-siegfried-at-los-angeles-opera.html

Gotterdammerung: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2010/06/a-pop-critic-reviews-the-ring-gotterdammerung-at-la-opera.html

Also Ring Festival LA has a pretty robust page happening on Facebook that keeps one apprised of what's going on about town. It only makes me wish I was there. The third and last cycle starts tomorrow night with Das Rheingold.

In Bloom

"Yes... and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes"
Yes, it's Bloomsday.

In Flight Entertainment

Lisa Hirsch makes a strong case that Francesca Zambello's Valkyries were probably conceived well before this brilliant little bit of marketing hit the airwaves, but I'm not so sure. My thought is if Zambello is going to subject the audience to the silly and distracting gimmick of parachuting Valkyries, she should have just gone all the way. I'd like to suggest this would be a great improvement over her beginning of Act III of Die Walkure than the one currently on display at The War Memorial Opera House:

NSFW:
http://www.m2film.dk/fleggaard/trailer2.swf

In Dreams

"tuned in to something I've been thinking a lot about lately -- the bridge between classical and contemporary music, and where one leads to another." - Renee Fleming

Hey Renee!

Over here, anytime you like. Just drop me note and I'll happily meet you anywhere. Want to see Shakira with me?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2010/06/opera-singer-renee-fleming-goes-pop.html

Photo by Andrew Eccles

In the mood for German

The San Francisco Symphony has a tradition in recent years of ending their season with a series of really well-performed, well-programmed concerts and this year is no exception. Originally I was going to attend the Saturday performance, since I had tickets for Faust on Friday. But after seeing Faust on Tuesday courtesy of a last-minute invitation, I was somewhat dreading have to endure it again at the end of a long week. I decided to persuade the Femme Fatale to skip French opera and instead go across the street for German symphonic works. Now I really thought I would fail at convincing a French woman to actually do this but decided it was worth the effort and thankfully I somehow prevailed.

Since the program included the last Davies After Hours event of the year, there were a number of younger women in the house who seemed dressed more for the club than for a symphony hall and I have to admit that made strolling through the Davies lobby much more interesting and pleasurable than it usually is. There were a number of younger men as well, usually in packs, and I thought to myself the SFS was getting pretty good at marketing the After Hours events though I was surprised this concert wasn't sold out.

Really, with a program of Wagner, Berg and Beethoven, how can one go wrong?

The first piece was the Overture to Wagner's Der Fliegende Hollander aka The Flying Dutchman. The performance lacked the thrilling energy of the last time I heard them perform it (when they did the entire opera as a semi-staged concert), but it was well-performed by the orchestra. It did leave me wanting more and brought back my destined-to-be-unfulfilled desire to see MTT conduct something across the street at the War Memorial. The brass were particularly effective.


Next up was Berg's Lulu Suite which was performed last year as part of the Schubert/Berg program. Erin Wall, who has had a number of great outings with the orchestra in the past few years, was the vocal soloist. Wall's voice pleases me for reasons I can't quite put my finger on, except to say that every time I hear her sing it sounds so effortless. Perhaps I'm influenced by her beauty, because I'm shallow that way. The suite gives the singer little to do in the grand scheme, but it is the highlight and Wall delivered Lulu's Song with a clear, elegant soprano which when combined with her elegant appearance created a disconnect in my mind between the nature of the song (a defiant justification by an amoral woman) and the woman singing it.

Having seen a superb version of the entire opera last month at the Met, hearing the suite was a less than satisfactory experience for me this time around, but that's my problem.


After the intermission came Beethoven's Violin Concerto- one of my very favorite pieces of music which inexplicably I'd never heard performed live. The soloist was James Ehnes and he was marvelous. This concerto isn't necessarily a technically challenging mountain like Berg's violin concerto, but it takes a tremendous amount of heart to play it well and Ehnes provided a soul-stirring account all the way through. The themes were beautifully rendered and the cadenzas soared. Interestingly, MTT conducted this with the score in front of him, something I'm not sure I've ever seen him do with a Beethoven work except for Fidelio and his account was devoid of the usual quirks in tempo that sometimes leave me unhappy with his interpretations of this composer's works.

Also interesting, to me at least, was the presence onstage of Alexander Barantschik, who usually takes a pass on sitting in his seat when there is a guest violin solist onstage. Barantschik seemed genuinely impressed with Ehnes' performance afterward. The horns were the only disappointment to me, failing to add warmth to the grandeur of the themes. The SFS's A Team were all present and as usual were excellent in support of Ehnes' memorable, beautiful performance.

As I mentioned before, the final After Hours event was held in the second tier lobby after the performance. The music was provided by Amy X Neuburg and the Cello ChiXtet. On paper this sounded wonderful but the reality was different as they couldn't maintain the crowd's interest and this event lacked the buzz usually found. That did make it easier to find and speak with the Symphony's Louisa and her kind husband,which is always a pleasure. They'll do it again next year, which is a good thing, though I still think it would be great if they could find a way to do it after all of the Friday night performances so that the audience just knows if it's Friday it must be After Hours.

With the next two weeks bringing the phenomenal Yuja Wang and an all-Berlioz program featuring Sasha Cooke, it's entirely likely the SFS will end their season on a high note. Get your tickets.

There is a final performance of this program this Sunday at the Flint Center in Cupertino.

Photo of Erin Wall by Larry Lapidus
Photo of James Ehnes by Benjamin Ealovega

In my time of dying: Die Walkure in San Francisco

San Francisco Opera's Die Walkure opened Thursday night and there were many things about it which justify the breathlessly great reviews it's received, but there also are some serious flaws in this production. The really good news is that none of those flaws originate from the pit or in the casting. The bad news is that as gesamtkunstwerk the production fails from the start of the vorspiel and the failure builds with each succeeding act. Should that keep you away? By all means absolutely not, because musically this production is as good as it gets.

After a two year absence, former music director and Wagner conductor extraordinaire Donald Runnicles returned to the pit of the War Memorial and tore into the vorspiel like he had something to prove and it was thrilling from the first note. His intensity never wavered for the remainder of the night. Runnicles brought things to the fore I've never noticed before- not to be novel or put his own stamp on it, but to show us just how deeply layered this music is. Everything was illuminated, and beautifully so. From a conducting standpoint it was the best music I've heard in this house since, well, when Runnicles was the music director of the house.

The casting was almost perfect as well. Nina Stemme's Brunnhilde was a revelation. This was the first Walkure I've experienced live where the soprano opted for clarity and purity over volume and bravado and her approach paid off handsomely. Vocally Stemme nailed it from her first "Heiaha" until her last pleading moment with Wotan without ever flagging or hitting an off-note. While her voice isn't large, it's always clear, precise and always blending into the music or emanating from it instead of fighting to be dominant over it ala Linda Watson. She also looks quite fetching in a bob and boots. While she captivated me more in her SF debut as Senta in Hollander, I'd ascribe that to a superior, more stimulating and interesting production.



Christopher Ventris' Siegmund was also a vocally arresting performance. This is the third role I've heard him sing here in SF and I admire his consistency and artistry. Working against stage directions which render his character either a fool or a self-centered ass, he still makes an indelible impression with his clarion tone and impassioned delivery. Too bad production director Francesca Zambello has no idea how to present this character (or most of the others) in a coherent manner, but more on that later.

Eva-Maria Westbroek made her SFO debut as Ventris' sister/lover Sieglinde with terrific singing and effective acting. If the "Du hehrstes Wunder! herrliche Maid!" wasn't the musical orgasm it could have been, should have been, she nevertheless gave an impressive performance.

Mark Delavan's Wotan impressed me more in 2008's Das Rheingold, but this is for two reasons that are beyond his control, the first being having recently seen Vitalij Kowoljow in L.A. Opera's Walkure, pretty much anyone one would pale in comparison. The second is again Zambello's fault, again, to be discussed in a moment. Delavan's voice served the role well, and though he looked ridiculous in his Pepe-le-Pew skunk-streaked do, eye-patch and three piece master-of-the-universe suit, it really wasn't his fault and I don't hold it against him.

Raymond Aceto's Hunding came across as too much of a vulgar punk instead of a malevolent, threatening force. His was the most ineffective portrayal of the night and his voice simply couldn't overcome his Vin Diesel does opera appearance and mannerisms.

Janina Baechle's Fricka, the Cruella DeVille of the story who just messes everything up with her moral rectitude, was really well performed. A harridan, and justifiably so. I seriously hate you Fricka. Think about how differently the story may have turned out if not for you and your sanctimonious views on marriage and incest. Get a life. Get a young hero to shtupp you and shut up.

The Walkyries were exceptional from a singing standpoint and good grief, talk about luxury casting in the smaller parts. Molly Fillmore (!), Suzanne Hendrix, Daveda Karanas, Wendy Harmer, Tamara Wapinsky, Maya Lahyani (the next Netrebko, even if she's a mezzo- you heard it here first), Pamela Dillard and Priti Ghandi sounded terrific, despite the fact that Zambello turned the Ride of the Walkyries into just about the dumbest thing I've ever seen on the War Memorial stage since the hazmat team invaded the ending of Katya Kabanova or the transvestites with Macy's bags killed MacBeth.

Okay, so I've covered the good stuff in full and now you know why you should see this. Now permit to tell you, dear reader, what really pissed me off about this production: Francesca Zambello.

What the hell is she thinking? Damned if I know, but here is a list in order of appearance of the offending, silly, and downright stupid choices she made that render this production a mess from a dramatic and visual standpoint:

Act 1 failures:

The Vorspiel begins with a video image of a churning whirlpool. Why? We are supposed to be in a forest, having Siegmund hunted ny Hundings kinsmen. The water was the previous opera. Granted, it was better than the ridiculous "and in beginning there was a galaxy" montage that opened Rheingold, but hello? Where is the water from? Why? Explain this please.

Hunding's house looks like something out of a bad production of "Little House on the Prairie" done by a high school in Turlock.

Hunding is groping Sieglinde's ass while Siegmund is telling his sorry story, paying no attention to him whatsoever. Is no one listening to him? Is he such a self-obsessed jerk that he can't tell that he should shut up so this guy can go bang his wife?

Hunding eats almost an entire meal before he realizes what's going on. Is he that dumb that he only realizes who is in his midst three minutes after he's been told? Where did you ever get the impression that Hunding is stupid? Hunding is not stupid. He is cruel. He is malevolent, but he is not stupid. Your directorial choices are stupid.

Lightning when Siegmund pulls the sword from the tree? Really? REALLY? This was the most hackneyed thing I've ever seen on an opera stage (to this point- she does surpass it at the end of the act) ever. I turned to the Opera Tattler, seated beside me, and just shook my head in dismay.



Siegmund and Sieglinde start to get it on, just like in Chereau's Ring, but then wait! Coitus interruptus as they run off into the sunset, both hands holding up Notung, with a glorious sunset on the back scrim. Okay, this wins as the most hackneyed thing I've ever seen on an opera stage. Absolutely awful! Disney does the Ring, it looked like it should have been in Sleeping Beauty.

Act 1 successes: well, the music and singing were superb.

Act 2 failures:

Brunnhilde bounds on the stage like Sandy Duncan in Peter Pan, with the exact same bob. Then proceeds to act like Sandy Duncan in Peter Pan.

Brunnhilde leaps on Wotan's back for a piggy-back ride. Again- what the hell were you thinking Francesca? Oh wait, you make that kind of clear at the end of the third act and frankly, it made me kind of nauseous.

WHY DOES BRUNNHILDE HAVE A PURSE? What exactly is in that bag, anyway? Heads of heroes?

Act 2 successes: two dogs run across the stage- neither stops to pee on the tree holding the sword!

Act 3 Failures:

Having the act start with video rather than live action for the most famous musical sequence of the entire Ring. Then the Valyries land on the stage done up as WW1 WAFS. Hello Ms. Zambello? They are Valkyries, not WAFS. This was just stupid- a novelty entrance meant to excite rather than illuminate the story or characters. Utter failure, especially since the program makes no mention of the fact that the images of fallen heroes they hold are actual U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq or Afghansitan. You almost are doing these men a disservice by not mentioning this to the audience in the program. Shame on you.



The final scene between Wotan and Brunnhilde. What is with all this cuddling and affection? Why is Brunnhilde sitting in his lap? In Act 2, when Fricka walks in and gives Brunnhilde a nasty look it appears like one of jealousy because she's the favorite child borne of another woman. By the time you get to Act 3, with all of this affection it looks like there has actually been two incestuous relationships going on in this opera and Fricka's initial disdain of Brunnhilde was more a look of "Why are you fucking my husband/your father?" disgust. I'm sorry, but this insinuation really creeps me out. What the hell is wrong with you that you want to go there? That's not a part of the story. Why make it all Jon Benet for us? Ugh. Gross. Creepy. Make it stop!

Act 3 successes: I did not get at all excited at the prospect of Wotan getting it on with his daughter.

Now, if you want to see how to stage this thing right, get your ass down to LA and see the Freyer Ring before it's over.

Over lunch, as I was relating my thoughts to him, Patrick asked me if I may have liked this more if I hadn't seen the brilliant LA Walkure a couple of weeks ago. Probably, but that's akin to asking if I think Lionel Ritchie could be considered funky if I never heard James Brown. Too late for all that, says I.

Finally, Lisa- nice to finally meet you, awkward as it was, and thank you for switching seats with Naomi.

All photos by Cory Weaver, stolen without shame from SFO's website.

In memory of: Liz Reiman 1962 - 2010

The first real rocker chick I ever knew, though her taste for the Grateful Dead and Bowie didn't match my own when we were kids.

We had Friday night poker games, she had more addictions than I could list and a terminal case of lymphoma which she somehow managed to beat that left her feeling invincible.

But she wasn't. Now she's gone. A unique, alive, large spirit always game for anything. Over.

She'll be missed.

In League with the Devil

San Francisco Opera's current production of Faust is everything I feared the Gockley era at SFO would come to represent: nothing terrible enough to complain about, but also nothing to get excited about. Now in all fairness, I am still feeling the aftershocks of seeing LA Opera's spectacular Ring, so anything I saw at this point is doomed to pale in comparison, but this is really a pedestrian affair that no one will be talking about a month from now much less in seasons to come. Despite a cast that could get some people excited, a fairly decent set and able conducting, this Faust never really goes anywhere and the origin of the problem is with the opera itself. It's just not well-constructed and should really be consigned to novelty status. How come we can never hear Menotti, yet this treacle gets staged all the time, all over the place? This is really all the more disappointing because if SFO proved anything last fall, it was that they can turn a sow's ear into a silk purse with ease. Not this time. Yet there was one very poignant scene, when the soldiers returned from battle. One dies on a stretcher center stage while freshly-minted widows receive flags in lieu of their men. This was really the most affecting part of the entire 3 hour and 45 minute evening. If there was ever an opera that desperately needs a contemporary interpretation, this is it.

The three principals- Stefano Secco in the title role, John Relyea as Mephistopheles and Patricia Racette as Marguerita in the end paled next to the Valentin of Brian Mulligan, whose nuanced portrayal and expressive singing made him the most interesting character onstage through the entire evening. Racette gathered force as the night wore on, but to see her cast as a young innocent didn't work for me at all. Her rendering of the "Jewel Song" prompted my companion Dr. Hank to disagree with me that that was indeed the song. Her performance in the second act reminded me too much of her recent appearance as Suor Angelica and by the third, when every thing comes together for her as far as voice and character go, I really had no sympathy left for whatsoever.

Relyea has a great, powerful voice and gave the comedic elements of the staging his all, but there was something off in his voice this evening and he sounded strained. Secco sounded like a small man trying on large shoes and they didn't fit for all his trying to stuff this and that into the soles. Is it his fault? Probably not. Gounod, unlike Berlioz, never makes these characters interesting to the audience. They're ciphers, stereotypes of the pure, the evil and the corrupted. Who cares about this in 2010 when the staging looks like it's from 1930?

Due to a prior engagement I'm going to see it one more time, but if I had to do it all over again, I'd just about sell my soul to avoid it. Skip this one. The high point for me? Having champagne during the intermissions with the OT and Herr Feldheim. Dr. Hank was a bit cranky with Alabama Craig that night and not his usual, engaging self. Look for him tonight at the opening of Fanciulla, which he is crankily attending alone.

In the Alley

In the alley outside of the Shooting Gallery.

In the Heights

Last week Dr. Hank, Alabama Craig and I went to the Curran Theatre to see the mutli-Tony Award winning In the Heights. There isn't a lot that SHN, the company that brings touring Broadway shows to San Francisco, was putting on this year that I felt I had to see this year, but this was the one exception. Is it a great show? Yes. Will it have legs? Will people want to see it in 10 years? I really don't know.

I appreciated the characters (all living near a corner in Washington Heights, almost all Latino) were in situations that felt real to me. But what do I know about that? I'm White, Jewish, and I grew up in L.A.- I don't know anything about New York's Latino culture from first-hand experience. Was the book configured to make white, middle-class theater-goers like myself feel good about these characters or do they really reflect the realities of people in the Heights? The audience was suspiciously non-diverse for this city- even at the theater, which only solidified my suspicions that this may be a show that's more feel-good than feels real (if you want to see the antithesis of that, go see Fela!). Still, I enjoyed it, even though this kind of thing often makes me uncomfortable.

What saves the show from being something truly awful (ala The Lion King) is the diversity of characters and their flaws, which gives the show a feeling of authenticity, even if it's fleeting. Elise Santora, who plays the neighborhood's aging matriarch, is sweet yet strong. Nina, played by Arielle Jacobs, drops out of Stanford and feels an acute sense of shame she couldn't cut it in the big leagues. Rogelio Douglas Jr.'s Benny is well aware that being black makes him forever on the outside, no matter how entwined he is in the lives of the family at the center of the story. There are three generations represented by the cast, who each have a different take on the neighborhood and its denizens. These characters, who sometimes come close to stereotypes but never crossed that line for me, are really the show's strength and composer Lin-Manuel Miranda does an excellent job of delineating them as distinct individuals through the songs and book. The people onstage come across as people you may actually know.

The music is good, but it sounds mostly like 80's style, feel-good, early Beastie Boys. There's nothing with an edge in the entire score, which is another indicator that In the Heights is more Spring Awakening than West Side Story. Sadly, there is only one number with a Reggaeton beat in the entire show and it's pretty watered down. I do know this- go into any largely Latino neighborhood in the U.S. right now and Reggaeton is the soundtrack of the street. Add to this one or two salsa-flavored numbers, and a couple of Bernsteinesque/West Side Story-flavored ballads and you have an idea of what the music sounds like. It's good if not instantly memorable (with the exception of one stand-out ballad), and delivered extremely well- especially by Shaun Taylor-Corbett, who does sound more than a little like the Beasties' Mike D, not least in the way he throws out a rhyme.

The set is vibrant, the cast is solid with the exception of one dancer who may have been a last minute sub, who seemed behind everyone all night and unsure of her marks. There are now discounted tickets available for the remaining performances on Goldstar. I recommend this one.

In the end, Bjork gets killed by Jack the Ripper

On today's WWD there is an article about the party following the closing of Marina Abramovic's "The Artist is Present" exhibition, where Abramovic spent 700 hours seated in front of people one at a time without moving or saying a word.

A rumour mentioned in this article says Italian designer/Givenchy savior Riccardo Tisci, opera director enfant-terrible Robert Wilson and Abramovic are collaborating on an opera.

The photo from the party appearing above of Abramovic and Bjork, taken by Steve Eichner, makes the mind reel at what this triumvirate could come up with, but I'd want to see it- especially if they cast Bjork in the lead.

If they were to actually do this, what opera would you like to see this creative team produce? I can only think of two real possibilities at the moment: Lulu and Lady MacBeth of Mtsensk.

Oh, and Lohengrin would be a natural fit, too.

What say you?

Marina Abramovic Institute West

During a random walk down down Sutter Street I came across two people working on an installation called "Making Visible" for the new Marina Abramovic Institute here in San Francisco. The performance features dancers Damian Smith and Muriel Maffre of the San Francisco Ballet). Choreography is by Folawole to music by Paul Dolley. Installation performances are from 4:30 - 8:30 June 4-6 and 11-13, and 12:30 - 4:30 June 7 and 9.

There is also a gallery downstairs, currently featuring "The Profession" by Michael Zheng, currently on display until July 2nd. Gallery Hours are Wed-Sat, 12:00 - 6:00 pm.

Abramovic's only other institute is in New York. This is an important addition to the Bay Area art scene so check it out. If you haven't heard of Abramovic, do a google search. Her current show at New York's MOMA was one of the most impressive and disturbing things I've ever seen and is generating a mountain of press and commentary.

The institute is at 575 Sutter