Stephen Llewellyn has been with Portland Opera for nearly four years. He has also been a barrister in Hong Kong, a professional folk singer and classically-trained tenor. He makes a mean zabaglione, and cries easily and frequently at opera performances.
One could have been forgiven for believing that the near canonization of Al Gore had been brought to a suitably impressive ending over the last eighteen or so months with his being awarded an honorary fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, prizes in Spain and Sweden, several honorary doctorates, the Sir David Attenborough Award for Excellence in Nature Film-making and an Emmy. Top those off with the conferral of last year's Nobel Prize for Peace and that's a pretty good year by anyone's reckoning. Short of his achieving something truly spectacular - winning Dancing With The Stars, say - it seemed to me as though Mr. Gore's post-presidential-candidature days had pretty much run their course. I had reckoned without them wacky folks at La Scala, Milan who have just announced that they have commissioned an opera. From the book of the documentary-movie of the slide-show of the same name they are to bring you An Inconvenient Truth. The work is to be written by Giorgio Battistelli artistic director of Verona’s Arena opera foundation and a man described as "a composer very much in tune with contemporary themes, including the environment.” I am having a great timewondering who is to be cast in the role of Mr. Gore. Nathan Gunn, perhaps? Who knows, perhaps crowning all of his other achievements Gore himself is a barihunk and will play and sing the role himself.
None of the above should be taken as suggesting I don't admire and respect Gore personally. I do. Very much. And I loved the movie An Inconvenient Truth. Somehow, though, making it an opera just seems a bit silly.
It's always fun to hear or read of a new talent in the world of opera. A frisson runs through the opera community. We had it with Pavarotti, Domingo and more recently Juan Diego Flòres. The latest name to surface bringing with it oohs and aahhs and general swooning is Jonas Kaufmann. This young German tenor is currently appearing as Cavaradossi in the production of Tosca currently running at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. I read a number of reviews of his performance and they ranged from the merely enthusiastic to the adulatory. At that point I needed to hear what the fuss is about and called Youtube to the rescue. Here is what I found: a concert performance of 'E lucevan le stelle' for German Television:
Pretty special, huh? I expect we shall be seeing him on a Met simulcast in the not-too-distant future.
And while on the subject of the Met, I had a delicious little episode of Schadenfreude when I read this. It was the last sentence: "The Met, which opened in 1966, also was penalized for using "unacceptable material." What could they mean? Philip Glass' Satyagraha?
'Armourer's apprentice required. Please contact Royal Opera House for details' seems like an unlikely situations vacant ad, but apparently there is such a post and it has now been filled. 20 year-old Robbie Candy was training as a luthier at Merton College, London when he was tapped to shadow the ROH's armourer, Rob Barham in the making and upkeep of all the swords, daggers and other weaponry essential to the artistic verisimilitude of period productions. Mr. Candy seems like the perfect choice. He says: "My auntie was in the Royal Ballet and my grandma was a dancer during the war. One of my great uncles was in a tap-dancing trio and then I had a great cousin who was a singer and an actress." I do so hope he has children because they will be able to add to that lineage "And my dad made swords for the Royal Opera House.” Now that's a show-biz family for you!
A couple of years ago I was passing through Covent Garden when I saw this chap on his lunch break and couldn't resist taking his picture. His name is Duncan Meadows, a body-builder (who would have guessed?) and a former Mr. Wales.
Now I read that he got a job at the immediately-adjacent Royal Opera House playing the Executioner in David McVicar's new production of Salome. This article in the London Times tells the unlikely story including how McVicar spoke to him while they were both at a gym (okay, that bit isn't unlikely). It would seem that this part requires him to show more skin than even his usual silver body-paint miming gig (see below).
Have a great week. I now need to go dust to off my centurion's outfit and scour the opera press for opportunities as an executioner. See you!
