washerman's dog: Opera

Saturday, June 30, 2012

Saturdaynight Sundaymorning: Chip Young, Carrie Rodriguez,Sofie von Otter, Elvis Costello

Chip Young, Carrie Rodriguez
Sofie von Otter, Elvis Costello

I used to buy Mojo magazine very regularly. My favorite feature was to be found on the very first pages of every edition. The same set of questions would be posed to three singers or figures of popular culture. The first record you ever bought? Who, besides yourself, you wanted to be? What do you sing in the shower? Your favorite Sunday morning record? Your favorite Saturday night record?

The answers are revealing not only of the person’s musical tastes but personality foibles. Some give irritated answers, “I don’t sing in the shower, thank you!”. Others, wax lyrical about the obscure or pedestrian leaving a lingering smell of BS.

It is Saturday night here in Australia. Tomorrow is Sunday. Here are my current answers to a couple of those questions.

Saturday night record: Chip Young and Carrie Rodrigues The Trouble with Humans. Unabashed, eloquent, wry, joyfully sung country duets by one of the better combos of voices to come together in recent years. They sing as if they were born to do so, together. They understand each other intuitively and bring the same playful intensity to the music, most of which is by Mr Young, himself. Their voices blend and bounce off each other just perfectly. Her’s is aching. His laconic, and tired. Perfection!

Sunday morning record: Anne Sofie von Otter and Elvis Costello For the Stars. This record came out more than a decade ago and sank with barely a trace. Deemed a bit pretentious and too ‘constructed’ by rock critics and too ‘lame’ by classical critics, it fell between the cracks of the labels in the record store. Costello is very much the driver but his voice is only heard on a couple of tracks, giving the honors to the Swedish opera star, van Otter. The material covers a wide range of writers (Tom Waits, Costello included) and while this record will not get your blood racing who needs/wants that on a Sunday morning? It is music to sit with in quietness and a cup of coffee. Especially in front of a window with a nice scene to gaze upon.

Track Listing:

(Saturday night)

01 Don't Speak In English

02 Memphis, Texas

03 All The Rain

04 Curves & Things

05 The Trouble With Humans

06 Oh Ireland

07 Fall

08 Laredo

09 Dirty Little Texas Story

10 Confessions

11 I Need A Wall

12 We Come Up Shining

13 Find Me A Killer

here

Track Listing:

(Sunday morning)

01 No Wonder

02 Baby Plays Around

03 Go Leave

04 Rope

05 Don't Talk (Put Your Head on my Shoulder)

06 Broken Bicycles/Junk

07 The Other Woman

08 Like an Angel Passing through My Room

09 Green Song

10 April After All

11 You Still Believe in Me

12 I Want to Vanish

13 For No One

14 Shamed Into Love

15 Just a Curio

16 This House is Empty Now

17 Take it With Me

18 For the Stars

here

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Russian Beefcake: Dimitri Hvorostovsky

Dimitri Hvorostovsky

It drifts toward you darkly, like a storm cloud, as if arriving from far away.

So has one critic described the burnished baritone voice of Dmitri Hvorostovsky, one of the current generation’s most dramatic and luscious opera singers.

Hvorostovsky who was born in Siberia but who has lived in London for most of his professional career crashed on to the classical music scene in 1989 when he performed a gigantic upset by winning the Cardiff Best Singer of the World Competition by beating hometown favorite, and stone cold superstar of the opera world (not to mention one of the Washerman’s Dog favorites), Bryn Terfel. Immediately signed to a lucrative recording contract, Dima as Hvorostovsky, is affectionately known, began to tear stage after stage around the world up with his polished Russian baritone.

Blessed (or cursed, depending on what time of the day he is being interviewed) with pound for pound more beefcake then most Hollywood leading men, silvery locks and rugged Slavic features, Dima has been labeled the Elvis of Opera and even had his looks ranked against those of George Clooney in the pages of People magazine. (He was in the global top 50).

Thus far he’s managed to avoid the traps of such media-created celebrity and stuck to the classical straight and narrow. Unlike his great peer and professional rival Terfel he’s avoided the dreaded ‘cross-over’ album and focused on producing serious classical vocal music.

Such as tonight’s feature Credo a stunning collection of Russian church music. Accompanied by the St Petersburg Chamber Choir, Hvorostovsky gives a soul melting and exhilarating concert that ranks as some of the best baritone singing I’ve ever heard.