Carmen: Who Is She?

Carmen ranks number one on my list of favorite operas.  What attracts me to this particular opera, however, is not just the music; it's the way the titular gypsy girl operates.  She is a very highly dangerous woman, but at the same time she is utterly fascinating.  Who is this character? 

Carmen is a fiery gypsy girl who prefers six-month-long dalliances with men rather than a committed relationship.  And she is part of a band of criminal smugglers.  When we first meet her, she is working a temp job in a cigarette factory (she can only be working a temp job there because she never stays in one place for long).  She seduces Don Jose who leaves the army to join her, and then she leaves him for the bullfighter, Escamillo.  Jose (who by that point is crazy obsessed with Carmen), tries to plead with her, but she will hear none of it, and so he kills her.  

But why does Carmen do the things she does?  There has got to be a reason.  And with that in mind and after listening to various mezzo-sopranos talking about the character (not to mention numerous discussions with my parents), I have come up with a plausible explanation.  

First off, Carmen is a gypsy and because of that she is poor.  She has spent pretty much her whole life wandering all over Spain because she has no real place to settle down, and she appears to have become accustomed to this nomadic lifestyle.  In fact, she revels in it.  She makes this very clear to Don Jose when she first seduces him, then reiterates it during their final confrontation at the end of the opera.  And secondly, she knows full well that there are men who are perfectly willing to use her for their own gain.  So she believes that if she calls all the shots in a relationship, then she's home safe.  It never occurs to her in 65 million years That someone would actually what to spend his life with her.  Which brings me to my third point, which is that Carmen is so used to the unscrupulous men that she hangs out with, she does not gain full understanding of why Don Jose is behaving jealously.  In fact, that kind of jealousy in alien to her.  While it's true that Don Jose is really in love with an idea of Carmen rather than with Carmen herself, his passion is something Carmen isn't used to.  And she learns the hard way not to seduce men who are used to good and honest women like Micaela.  

I think that explains a thing or two about the character.  

Eat Your Heart Out, Richard Wagner!

Leitmotif City!  How much Richard Wagner music did Howard Shore listen to?  The Peter Jackson film version of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit (and the Lord of the Rings movies) is full of leitmotifs.  

Simply put, a leitmotif is a melody associated with a character, object, place, or event.  While Wagner did not invent it, he made it popular.  It helps to tell the story if there is some tune that is associated with something in the story.  If Wagner were to hear the soundtrack from Peter Jackson's LOTR and Hobbit films, he'd be in hog heaven.  He loved leitmotifs (see Anna Russel for more info).

What I am saying is that Howard Shore's music is full of leitmotifs, including ones from the LOTR trilogy.  We heard a new melody associated with the Dwarves, but there are also the old Ring and Shire motifs.  

Wagner would be pleased.  


 

Which One Do I Prefer?

After seeing Un Ballo in Maschera twice, I must say I don't know which interpretation of Count Renato Anckarstrom I like the best; is it the handsome Korean Hyung Yun or the sexy Russian Dmitri Hvorostovsky?  I can't decide either way.  

Hyung Yun's performance was the one I saw on stage at Overture.  Aside from his sexy 18th Century black costume and wig, I loved how he did the role.  I was up in the nosebleed section so I could only just see his face.  

Dmitri Hvorostovsky was the one I saw perform in the Met simulcast yesterday.  This was a new production which set the story in the 1930s (or sometime thereabout).  His costume was mostly a grey suit although he donned a burgundy one in the final act.  I could see his face clearly.  

I think that both were superb in their performance of the aria "Eri Tu Che Macchiavi" ('Twas Thou that Marred the Soul).  In it, Renato swears vengeance on King Gustavo for messing around with Mrs. Anckarstrom, and then laments the loss of his marital bliss.  I loved how Yun and Hvorostovsky were both able to communicate to the audience not only his bitterness and anger at the king and his grief at his wife's own infidelity.  It takes quite an effort to sing this aria.  It's not easy to communicate musically both the feelings of anger and sadness.  It takes a master singer and actor to execute it properly.  And that's what both baritones did.  

So I really can't say who is better.  Hyung Yun and Dmitri Hvorostovsky are both incredibly talented and amazingly sexy baritones who can pull off any role without much trouble.  I don't even think I can compare the two.