After watching last night's episode of Project Runway, I thought about how often exceptionally gifted, intelligent, perceptive, and discerning persons come across as snarky. I think you know which contestant I'm talking about. I have to admit I'm a fan of a turn of phrase that, were one or two words removed, might seem like a nonchalant pleasantry.

Leopold Mozart, Wolfie's pop, seems to have been a master of this. In this letter to his sister, he describes one of the most famous and virtuosic sopranos of his day, Lucrezia Agujari (1746 - 1786). Total boner at first:

We made the acquaintance of a singer in Parma, and also heard her to great advantage in her own house—I mean the far-famed Bastardella. She has, first, a fine voice; second, a flexible organ; third, an incredibly high compass. She sang the following notes and passages in my presence:

[Click for a larger view]

I mean, really: "flexible organ"? Come on, Moldy Leopoldy! You're showing! Ok. Then, hilariously, he offers this description of her some years later:

[She has a] wild look in her eyes, like that of people who are subject to epilepsy, and she limps with one foot. Otherwise she has a good presence, a good character and a good reputation.

WHAT? Is this only funny and horrible to me? Am I the only one imagining your old-biddy auntie who somehow always manages to make compliments feel like fork stabs? "She looks retarded and has clubfoot, but she's nice." What a cock! If I ever found some fish-eyed gimp chick who ran around singing high-high C's and jumping two and a half octaves down after a rapid ascending scale, I'd give her a tiara and crown her Queen of Motherfucking Everything.

It is interesting to note that Aldous Huxley mentions Agujari (though with an alternate spelling) in his Brave New World. After bathing, Lenina is being scented and serenaded by, well, a "scent organ":

The scent organ was playing a delightfully refreshing Herbal Capriccio—rippling arpeggios of thyme and lavender, of rosemary, basil, myrtle, tarragon; a series of daring modulations through the spice keys into ambergris; and a slow return through sandalwood, camphor, cedar and newmown hay (with occasional subtle touches of discord—a whiff of kidney pudding, the faintest suspicion of pig's dung) back to the simple aromatics with which the piece began. The final blast of thyme died away; there was a round of applause; the lights went up. In the synthetic music machine the sound-track roll began to unwind. It was a trio for hyper-violin, super-cello and oboe-surrogate that now filled the air with its agreeable languor. Thirty or forty bars—and then, against this instrumental background, a much more than human voice began to warble; now throaty, now from the head, now hollow as a flute, now charged with yearning harmonics, it effortlessly passed from Gaspard's Forster's low record on the very frontiers of musical tone to a trilled bat-note high above the highest C to which (in 1770, at the Ducal opera of Parma, and to the astonishment of Mozart) Lucrezia Ajugari, alone of all the singers in history, once piercingly gave utterance.

Oh, man. Huxley totally makes me want to try LSD! Sorry this post sucks so much, but I'm busy downloading ten different live versions of Semiramide, including one of the Meyerbeer version on accident!

I forgot Maria Callas's birthday. Shoot me.

Nevermind. I guess I did sort of celebrate it. Someone somewhere posted a video clip of Maria Callas in the Paris Norma. Sound had been dubbed over from the in-house recording. How exciting to watch how deliberate an representational her acting was. I've always been of the opinion that naturalistic acting simply does not translate well in the house; in fact, it often becomes unbearably boring. I mean, look at how people act in real life—we are clumsy, ungraceful, figdety, or stalk-still. I see enough of it everyday; it sucks to see it on stage.

Then I got on a little weekend Callas kick. I love Callas the Show Stopper. I am particularly enamoured of her inclusion of the high e-flat at the end of the Triumphal Scene in Aïda. If you're an operaphile, you probably already know the story, but for those that are newbies, the history of this interpolation seems to have begun with Ángela Peralta, a famous Mexican soprano of the later mid-1800's. Peralta debuted in opera at the age of 15 as Leonora in Il Trovatore. Amazingly, her repertoire came to include Lucia di Lammermoor, Amina in La Sonnambula, Rosina in Barbiere, and Aïda (which she was the first to sing in Mexico).

Maria Callas debuted in Mexico City at the Palacio de Bella Artes in May of 1951. It didn't take long for the audience to warm up to her. The story is recounted on Opera-L (which I believe is paraphrased from some Callas biography):

After the dress rehearsal for Aïda, held on May 29, [impresario Antonio] Caraza-Campos asked Maria to sing the e-flat that the Mexican soprano of the eighteenth century Ángela Peralta used to sing at the end of the second act. She answered after a guffaw that it was impossible because many reasons, it was not written, she should ask it to the conductor and her colleagues, which she was not to keen to do, i.e. to ask, and lastly that it was of bad taste.

The premiere of Aïda came on May 30, with Callas as the Ethiopian princess, Simionato as Amneris, Baum as Radames, Rober Weede as Amonasro and Moscona as Ramfis. After Celeste Aida, Baum had a great ovation as Maria after Ritorna vincitore. During the intermission after the first act, Moscona went to Maria's dressing room where he spoke to her in Greek igniting her anger, apparently conveying some things said by the tenor. She called Diaz-Dupond and asked to go to the conductor Picco and the other singers, with exception of Baum, asking permission to sing the e-flat "because if Baum tries to f… (fregarmi) keeping the high tones, he will surely listen to them". When she sang that legendary E flat happened all what the diva was pursuing, the theatre became a mad house in frenetic applause and Baum exploded. During the curtain calls at the end of the second act, Baum, in English, told her "You will never sing in America, this was a real 'porcheria'", she just answered smiling and going out to accept the love of the audience, "We will see… "

Maria rather enjoyed the interpolation—so much so that she included when she returned to Mexico City the next year. This recording is taken from one of those 1951 performances (alas, no recording of Ángela Peralta). Mario del Monaco is an heroic Radamès; Oralia Dominguez, the raw and wild Amneris.

Maria Callas et al. - Triumphal Scene from Aïda, Mexico City, 1951

The greatly underrated soprano Marisa Galvany took up the torch in the 70's when she included the high e-flat interpolation in some Aïdas (again in Mexico City). Of course, these performances may be more famous for when one of the camels took a huge dump onstage (in true Handelman style, I must say, "Mai più). I don't have that run on mp3, but I do have Galvany's Triumphal Scene (with e-flat, natch) from San Jose in 1971, I think. Grace Bumbry and some dudes I've never heard of are also in the cast.

Marisa Galvany et al. - Triumphal Scene from Aida, San Jose, 1971

And then we have Millo. Lord, ô Lord. Whatever, we all know what she's like. Basically, the personified form of the phrase, "No, you shouldn't have." The e-flat starts out well enough, but then it curdles and collapses. I mean, I dunno; was she trying to do some sort of blue note bend? To her credit, though, Nello Santi takes that final stretto so fast, I'm sure Millo didn't even have a chance to snatch a breath; it is a barrage, rather than a natural rhythmic impulse to help set up the voice.

Aprile Millo et al. - Triumphal Scene from Aïda, Met in the Parks, 1986

Oops.

For your consideration:

On December 10, the Lyric Opera of Chicago will audition non-speaking supernumeraries for its new production of Verdi's Rigoletto. On the company's ambitious wish list: "Adonis-like" men, attractive young women with no objection to appearing topless, and "men of short stature" with "gymnastics or tumbling skills." The Lyric is seeking six younger men to play "Classical Men" for the production: they will wear "physique-revealing toga outfits" and must be able to climb ropes and ladders…

I'm nominating Tommasini, but for which category?

Pol Plançon - Enfant cheri … Le tambour-major from Le Caïd, by Ambroise Thomas. I am freaking the hell out, y'all. Last night I was charging around my apartment Marguerite Perrin-style because I couldn't find my one and only copy of the sheet music to this Ambroise Thomas aria. I have a feeling I threw it away in a some grand expungent gesture before the first time Twan (né Noise Band Dude) came over to my apartment. How will I ever be able to practice all the roulades and turns and arpeggii and trill with accuracy now? Also, what the hell are the words? I can make out several of them, but ugh! I NEED THE MUSIC CAN'T YOU SEE THAT I AM FIENDING FOR THE DRUM MAJOR'S ARIA HERE PLEASE HELP ME. I have done an excellent job of learning the notes by rote simply by listening to the four recordings I have of it. Granted, one is a very pedantic take from Ezio Pinza (who is one of my favorite basses, but still). The other three are of my very favorite bass, Pol Plançon. If I had the emotion called Jealousy, I would be pointing its trident at Plançon's facility, clarity of diction, and the cedille hanging from his last name like a hesitant and hydrophobic turd crust. This recording is his last and best—the one from 1907, when he was like 53 years old. It's astoundingly fresh. His trill. God, his trill. His God Trill. IT IS SO DIFFICULT TO TYPE THAT WORD WITHOUT ADDING THE SECOND R.

Anyway, someone quick, find me the sheet music to this so that when I go onstage for the first round of Met Auditions next year, my pianist will have something to play from, and I won't be singing dazzling fiorature to retarded fantasia lyrics à la "Wrapped up like a douche." Also, someone find me more recordings of males doing excellent trills. Did Hyppolite Belhomme record this aria? Why is this invaluable record of singing passing away from us? COME BACK TO THE LIGHT.