One of my longest-held dreams is being realised next Saturday when I sing the baritone part in Bizet’s beautiful duo for tenor and baritone “Au Fond du Temple Saint” from his opera The Pearl Fishers. Yes, he did write another one.
This will be my second “solo” effort, and the first for 36 years. Last time I did the treble solo for one of Charles Stanford’s many Magnificat settings, and it was in truth pretty dire. I was never asked again to do a solo before my voice broke. Or indeed after.
The fellow I will be singing with (who will be taking the Nicolai Gedda part) has Grade 8 in singing, so no problem there, even if his pronunciation of the French does leave a bit to be desired. He takes the part of Nadir and I’m his mate Zurga (not Zenith, which I thought might be more appropriate). We both fancy the same bird, who turns out to be a goddess, which makes it difficult to talk to her, let alone anything more ambitious. In the end, sensibly, I think, we decide it’s no use fighting over her and we swear to be the best of friends “jusqu’ a la mort”. Very French.
I’m okay with the notes (the harmony’s quite jammy) but a bit dodgy on the entrances. Bloody Bizet keeps bringing me in off the beat, so I’m virtually always late - except when I’m early. Anyway, got a couple more rehearsals and plenty of time to sing along with the CD. Wish me luck! I still remember how nervous I got last time.
Thanks for saving this from the fate of my two Eagles’ threads, which drew the dreaded void. The shower is probably the best place for my vocal efforts, besides the choral setting where I can sit next to the bloke who knows what he’s doing and follow along. Actually, the tenor section in an amateur choir is really a glorified shower, full of show-offs (and one or two masochists, I would suspect) who don’t care if they make a lot of cock-ups so long as they get a bit of applause at the end of the day. I don’t think we ever really reflect on the sad fact that invariably all the people giving that applause are in the concert hall on sufferance because we pressurized them into buying a ticket; or, even more sadly, because we paid for a whole wad of tickets and then had to find some takers.
I’m actually quite good at sketches and impressions, but you know what it’s like, we always want to do what we can’t really do. Well, me anyway.
roger (or, if I may be permitted to call you by your middle name, “o.”) , I am duly impressed.
I’m rather fond of Bizet, and especially of The Pearl Fishers. Au fond du temple saint is indeed a lovely piece. Lyrics (with translation) are here if anyone’s interested.
You’re a brave man. If I were in HK I’d come and listen.
Why is that sad? They showed up, didn’t they? And they didn’t have to applaud if they didn’t want to.
I once went to a performance of The Pirates of Penzance that was truly, um, riveting (you could tell that the pirates had plastic swords, the “set” was three fake ficus trees, so at points there were three pirates and two bobbies hiding behind each tree and not noticing each other!). I realized about an hour in that pretty much everyone there had to know someone in the cast. But I honestly appreciated the (good) parts, and my applause was for the performance. I suspect that a good many people there, even if they’d been pressed into attendance, also genuinely enjoyed it.
So, my dear roger, don’t focus on how your audience got there; focus on showing them a rousing good time. So that maybe next time they’ll buy their own ticket.
Antonius, thanks for the link to the lyrics. What an interesting piece!
Just popping in with an update for my hardcore fans. The rehearsal yesterday went much better, and we still have one to go before the big day. The tenor is v. good for an amateur, and I’m a lot more secure now (musically - psychologically, probably never); but the real star of the show is the accompanist, my daughter’s piano teacher. What a sight reader she is! And she says she’s going to get a flautist for the big night.
If you want to get a CD, I recommend a collection of Nicolai Gedda’s singing which includes this duet. If Joan Sutherland is La Stupenda, this bloke (half-Swedish, half-Russian - speaks seven languages…BASTARD!) is Il Phenomeno. Such a pure tone. So non-self-indulgent.
I’m impressed: the tenor part (with the top B flats) is punishing - the baritone’s a doddle by comparison. Strangely enough, my Choir (who I will be rejoining in the autumn) are singing Tippett’s Child of Our Time on Sunday. I remember a thread on this recently. I’m sort of pleased my return will coincide with Mozart’s Mass in C Minor, which is right up there with Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and his own Requiem for me. And I’ve sung it before a couple of times, which always makes things easier.
By the way, how much interaction with Zurga do you as Nadir work in to a performance when you do it on stage - in a reasonably informal (i.e. casual dress, not black tie) setting? After all, the two fishermen are swearing eternal devotion to one another! Just interested on feedback on that dynamic.
Probably mine. My choir did two performances of *A Child of Our Time * last weekend. There’s a review here.
I’ve always done it very formally, either in black tie or just in lounge suit. In fact, the first time I was still at school and wore my school uniform. So very little interaction, other than the odd hand gesture.
It was passable. The acoustics of the hall (not built for musical performance, as the name of the venue might indicate) were very dead, and the flautist (who the music teacher brought in at rather late notice) was under-prepared. Despite that, it was well received by the adults in the audience, at least, who had perhaps had a little too much of “Little Indians” and “Bee-bop-hop” by that stage!