The Clarinet BBoard

The Clarinet BBoard The C4 standard

New Topic | Go to Top | Go to Topic | Search | Help/Rules | Smileys/Notes | Log In

Previous Message | Next Message

Re: Met Clarinetist

Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2010-12-14 14:47

Eric Seddon wrote,
>>For what my opinion is worth, I think the Met (and other ensembles) will reach a new generation through this sort of thing. Can you imagine hearing kids quizzing each other on lietmotifs at the bus stop? I've overheard mine doing just that since showing them those video tapes from '90. Can't imagine what they'll be like after surround sound and theatre environment.
>>

I've also seen kids respond enthusiastically to opera, and to classical music in general, simply because they had the chance to hear the music. When kids can watch the musicians making the music, too, it's an even more powerful experience. Interest in classical singing seems to be spreading. Several TV commercials feature legit operatic voices now, and not always as parody.

My own first reaction to opera was a little bit on the negative side because of the *type* of first exposure I got when I was about two years old. One of my aunts (my mother's sister) sang coloratura soprano. She had the lighter type of coloratura, not the Broadway belter or the megawatt Wagnerian with the heavy vibrato (she sang Yum Yum in The Mikado, other Gilbert and Sullivan roles and a lot of baroque oratorios, for instance), but even so, it was a real chest-tone coloratura and she could nail it to the back wall of a concert hall if she wanted to. Mom sang contralto (she and her brother and sister used to sing together as the Wrany Trio on radio in the early 1930s), but it was a darker voice than my aunt's and Mom was careful to sing half-voice around little kids at close range. Though I'd met Aunt Mary before, she lived on the opposite side of the continent. I only slightly remembered her. I really had no idea what was coming, the first time she stood up next to the family piano. I expected her to sound like Mom. Instead, Aunt Mary launched full-voice, with her arms spread wide, red-lipsticked large mouth suddenly gaping, full of gleaming white teeth, in the living room, from a distance of just a few feet -- I ran and hid! We ended up close friends, but that introduction, before I got to know her very well, was overwhelming for a toddler.

Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.

Reply To Message | Avail. Forums | Flat View

Newer Topic | Older Topic

Topics