January 25, 2007

• Shit, thought the clock had clicked over. Arse.
• I was on the procrastinator's clock, though.
• Wow. 68, and his voice is changing. Good for him! Let's hope he can pull it off -- but even so, if anyone has earned the right to an artistic error or two, it's him.
• If anyone can pull it off, it's him. He's akways had a huge range and flexibility.
• This may translate as "his high notes are no longer reliable, but he wants to keep singing." I'll be interested to hear him try it. The question is, does he have the low notes?
• My thought too. It can't be easy for a tenor to watch their high end go like that.
• I've always thought he had more of a baritone quality anyway. Good for him.
• I'm anxious to hear how it goes. He's always been a favorite of mine, too. I was thinking along the same lines as Pallas Athena, but if he's still got it on the low notes, more power to him.
• Damn men and their damn long-lasting voices, dammit.
• I didn't get hair on my chest until I was almost 30.
• Yeah, I agree with Bone - of the most famous modern tenors, I've always thought that Domingo's voice was the darkest, with a definite baritone quality. Without the high notes he sounds like a baritone to me (albeit maybe a slightly high-pitched one, what I used to jokingly call a "baritenor").
• What happened to the_bone, Bone?
• Sometimes articles just up and disappear, the_bernockle.
• I think that he has gone from a noun to an adjective, and I simply want to know why. I mean, what if we all decided to become verbs? Then what? Does nobody think of these things?
• what if we all decided to become verbs? I'm dying to find what the verb "to bernockle" could mean.
• With reference to what verbminx and Bone said, dramatic tenors-- the bigger, stronger tenor voices capable of singing huuuuge roles like Calaf in Turandot ("Nessun Dorma") and Canio in I Pagliacci-- tend to sound a bit more baritonal and have more strength in the middle of their range. Domingo is one of these. (Dramatic sopranos, the Turandots and Brünnhildes of this world, tend to sound more mezzo-ish for the same reason.) Domingo has survived this long by (a) using good vocal technique, (b) limiting his commitments and (c) choosing his operatic roles very carefully. As a baritone, I'd expect him to do the same-- choose highish baritone roles that are light enough for a tenor to sing. But then I read the article and thought "Holy shit-- Boccanegra????" Bloody hell. Well, he wouldn't do it if he didn't feel confident, but it's definitely going to challenge him. And he's taking it to London in 2009-10, when he'll be seventy. I'm not religious but I think I'll start praying for him now.
• Bone is no longer the bone but merely a bone... the question is, which bone is he?
• And in other opera news: First Nations group helps stage version of The Magic Flute.
• Domingo is the only one of the Three Tenors whom I have not been on stage with at some point. My college choir (I went to a pretty serious music school) backed up both Carreras and Pavarotti in concerts in the early 1990s. The Pavarotti concert was particularly rad... it was a free outdoor concert on Miami Beach, and it took place on my 22nd birhday. The opportunity to stand on stage with Pavarotti (my fave of the three, although not my all-time favorite tenor) felt like a birthday present from God. Domingo is probably the strongest overall musician... he has a career as a conductor as well, whereas I recall rumors as far back as music school that Pavarotti couldn't read music (which was confirmed by his former manager; Pavarotti denies the charge).
• What happened to the_bone, Bone? I killed him and am now wearing his skin, like a digital version of "Buffalo Bill" from Silence of the Lambs. He put the lotion in the basket.
• Bone Bill. I like it. (Just don't do that weird "tucking" dance, mmkay?)
• the new Bone is connected to the(old)_bone? I feel a song coming on.