La Boheme
I guess it had to be an Albanian soprano to get me to go the Michigan Opera Theater for the very first time. Or perhaps, in the past, I thought I could spend my money more efficiently somewhere else. Yes, I shamefully admit this was the first time I attended an opera ever since I've moved to the US.Last night we went to see La Boheme together with some other Albanian friends, one of them being a tenor himself (and we were afraid he'd start singing during the show!). I've seen this opera before so the story wasn't new to me. But this production was quite nice, with some humor weaved into this sad story. The singers were all good. Rodolfo was played by an Hungarian tenor while Mimi was played by the Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho. Frankly, I had not heard about her before, but she was impressive! After singing in Albania, Italy (where she has won the Puccini competition) and other countries in Europe, she made her US debut here in Michigan - and a powerful one indeed. I can't make any professional comments since I am not one. But I thought all the crew was quite good.
Afterwords we went down to the artists' dressing rooms and were able to meet Mrs. Jaho. She seemed very nice, down to earth and friendly.
I can't say I'm a huge fan of operas, although I've seen and know most of the famous ones - for some reasons classical music is a tad more appealing to me. My father has been the major influence on me to listen to operas. Although not an "educated" man, he knew all the operas by heart! I remember how, everytime there were operas on TV, he'd sing them along. Apparently, he used to go to operas often when he was young.
I was quite impressed with the theater itself as well. The architecture was similar to European opera houses, although it was originally built as a theater and then underwent several changes (http://www.motopera.org/doh/history.html). We were up high on the balcony (uhm... the cheapest tickets) but we could hear everything very well. I was suspicious that the sound was amplified electronically, but, apparently, that's not the case. The design of the building allows for this fantastic acoustic!
Needless to say, it was worth the drive, the ticket and the $10 for parking (ok, maybe this one wasn't worth it). So now I'll be checking the opera's calendar more often - Aida will be coming in April of next year and I don't want to miss that.
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on Saturday, November 12, 2005 at 11:45 AM.
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