cahn | black box exchange noms

Of course I'm doing these instead of the work I'm totally behind on *facepalm*

Let me know if anyone wants me to nominate more characters or groupings. ~~or if there's a request I should make, if this means you will write or draw me a treat :D~~ You can see that in most cases I am just going to request one or two things, so I am totally willing to give up some of these slots if someone prefers something else.

I'm also willing to give up a fandom slot or two if someone comes up with something else I've forgotten :D

Turandot: Liu, Turandot, Calaf, Emperor, Group: Turandot & Liu (will request: Turandot & Liu)

Der Ring des Nibelungen: Loge, Sieglinde, Brunnhilde, Wotan, Freia, Fricka, Group: Brunnhilde & Sieglinde (will either request B&S or any)

Pelleas et Melisande: Pelleas, Melisande, Golaud, Arkel, Yniold, Genevieve, Worldbuilding (will request: Worldbuilding, but will make it clear in letter that I want any characters)

Don Carlos - Schiller: Elisabeth, Posa, Philip, Eboli, Carlos, Duke of Alva (will request: Any)

Les Contes d'Hoffman: La Muse|Nicklausse, Dapertutto, Coppelius, Lindorf, Dr Miracle, Giuletta, Antonia, Olympia, Hoffman, Group: La Muse & Dapertutto etc. (will request La Muse & Dapertutto etc., or possibly Any)

La Clemenza di Tito: Tito, Sesto, Vitellia, Servilia, Annio, Group: Tito & Sesto & Vitellia & Servilia & Annio, Group: Tito & Sesto (will request Any)

La Traviata - Verdi/Piave: G Germont, A Germont, V Valery, Group: G Germont & V Valery (not sure if I will request, but if I do will request Germont & Valery)

Ballo in Maschera: Renato, Amelia, Riccardo, Oscar, Group: Amelia/Renato (will request Amelia/Renato)

Simon Boccanegra:Simone, Fiesco, Amelia (will request Any)

Forza: Alvaro, Carlo di Vargas, Leonora (will request Alvaro)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

zdenka

I don't know what to nom/request, I can't deciiiide! I threw in Magic Flute and added some relationship noms to Don Carlo, but for the rest I'm paralyzed by too many choices. I could possibly be persuaded to nominate some things in particular if you or anyone has requests/suggestions. That's a very good set of noms you have, though! I was wanting more opera in the tag set.

It makes me a little grumpy that AO3 syns the Muse to Nicklausse, because that's only canon in productions that include that epilogue. I first encountered the opera without it, so I got used to Nicklausse as his own person, and every time I see the tag I'm like "But what if Nicklausse isn't the Muse, huh??" But I don't mean to spoil your fun if you have cool Muse-related ideas for your requests, and if you want it you should totally nom/request it.

From:

cahn

:DDDD Okay I've gone and nominated all the things in my post!

Ooooh let's see. What about G&S, do you have any favorites there you might want to request fic of? (I feel like they're a little too goofy for my brain to want to request fic about them, but I might be persuaded to offer!) Arabella? Nozze? Hmm, what Verdi have I not nominated? There are Otello and Macbeth, but those are sort of sufficiently close to the Shakespeare that it almost seems like it might make more sense to nominate Shakespeare? Rigoletto or Trovatore or Aida? (None of these is a favorite of mine, though in Aida's case I think I just got unlucky with the production and I should try again.) Tosca? Iphigenie en Tauride?

What do you think about Britten? I was toying with the idea of finishing watching Peter Grimes, which I was riveted by (and then the pandemic started and I just sort of lost a lot of ability to watch anything, but I should get back to it) but I seem to vaguely remember that you are less a fan of Britten than I am in general?

Haha, the only production I've seen (well, I saw 1.5 but the half was the same production with different singers) has that -- did you mean prologue? There was definitely a prologue in the one I watched where it says explicitly that she'll disguise herself as Nicklausse. a prologue where they make it really clear they're the same. So I do totally think of them as the same, and also I rather think of the four villains as having commonality too, and the version I saw leans into that a bit by having Nicklausse and the villain-of-the-piece always really aware of one another, like they know that there's something odd about the other. Well, okay, and it's Hampson and Kate Lindsey, who are both amaaaaazing. Here are a couple of clips so you can see just how great they are (and Grigolo as Hoffman is great too and works off of them really well) although unfortunately you can't really see the particular interplay I'm talking about in these clips:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lk9qiHdK5OY
(the trio about the eyes, Hampson's face when Hoffman keeps not giving him money makes me crack up every time)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkKTear_olc

I have a recording somewhere but it looks like maybe only the first half??

From:

zdenka

Yay!

I love G&S but I don't usually need fic of it. If I did, it would be one of the more serious bits, like maybe Iolanthe and the Lord Chancellor. Or I could go super obscure and nominate Sullivan's only grand opera, Ivanhoe, though I'd be surprised if anyone offered it!

Hmm, I should look at the two Iphigenie operas and see if anything there inspires me. There's also Berlioz's Les Troyens, on the Greek mythology theme. (Or some non-operatic Greek tragedy.) For me, Nozze is perfect already! So I don't need fic, though I might offer if someone requested it. Arabella is a possibility! It might feel a little strange asking for it when I've been going by Zdenka for so long. *g*

I'm not familiar with a lot of Britten tbh. I saw his A Midsummer Night's Dream once and enjoyed it, to my surprise (though for AMSND I'd probably request the original Shakespeare or the ballet). I was also the pianist's page-turner for a small production of Albert Herring, and I wound up liking the music okay by the end, but I found the plot kinda cynical and depressing. From reading the synopsis, Peter Grimes also seems too modern/depressing for me.

Okay, so, Tales of Hoffmann has a somewhat tangled history. Apparently Offenbach left it incomplete when he died and it was pulled together into an opera by someone else--this is the "standard" version I'm used to and which I have a score of. (Offenbach's manuscript notes were later destroyed in a fire, which didn't help.) In my score, there is no Muse-related prologue. The only mention of the Muse is when she shows up in part of the Epilogue to claim Hoffmann as hers, and he sings a love song to her before falling over drunk--but that part is often cut, in my experience. That score doesn't say anything about Nicklausse being the Muse. However, I went and checked my mother's score just now--she has the Dover edition, with the same lack of Muse prologue and presence of Muse in the epilogue that I remember, but it does have a forward stating very firmly that the four villains are the same, the four love interests are the same, and Nicklausse is the Muse. :D

But there have been other reconstructions too--I know the performance order of the acts varies between productions/scores, and with the one you linked me, it looks like someone went back to Offenbach's notes and constructed a somewhat different version. For example, the Eyes Trio is a lovely piece of music which I've never heard before. :D In the version I know, there's no trio and Coppelius has an aria there, "J'ai des yeux."

Version with French subtitles, with José Van Dam: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaWmEqiUaNg
Version with English subtitles, with James Morris: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_Eyk6DxNVw

I mostly learn operas from scores and sound recordings--I think you have more experience with watching live/videorecorded performances than me. So I honestly can't tell you what the common performance practice is nowadays--whether lots of opera houses are using the version you linked, or if they use the score I'm used to but every opera house assumes Nicklausse is the Muse, even if the score doesn't explicitly say so, and it's just that I didn't know, or if the Muse is cut out altogether. I do like the production you linked, and of course Hampson is always great (and Kate Lindsey is great too, I agree!). I don't even necessarily dislike Nicklausse=Muse, I just don't like it being the assumed/only version, if that makes sense? And the piped tag makes it hard to include other versions.

If you want that production/reconstruction specifically, it might be worth using the "nominate a specific version/production" option, if your noms haven't been approved yet? Or maybe look into the different versions and see how you feel about them?

From:

shewhostaples

I thought about Iolanthe but I don't know what I'd request. Either nitpicky specific constitutional worldbuilding or Mountararat/Tolloller, maybe.

In: obscure English* grand opera, I was also thinking of Maritana, but I'm not sure it's actually possible to write the Lazarillo->Don Cesar hero worship that I want without hitting something squicky somewhere.

From:

cahn

...okay, I suppose I should at least watch Iolanthe :D And of course the Romeo and Juliet you nominated is on my list to watch too!

Huhhhhh is there a way for me to watch Maritana? That sounds interesting. (Now, whether I have time to watch all this before August is another question entirely... although I suppose there are always future exchanges!)

From:

zdenka

I wound up not nominating Iolanthe, but I do recommend it. It has some very beautiful music (including fairy music that sounds to me like it's influenced by Mendelssohn's ballet of of A Midsummer Night's Dream) and a good mix of serious and silly. At least listen to the overture if you only have a few minutes!

I'm also fond of it as a singer because it has some of the most fun material for the female chorus among the G&S operettas. :) The Act I Finale is fantastic fun to perform.

From:

zdenka

I didn't nominate Iolanthe this time, but it is a gorgeous operetta.

Ooh, I'm not familiar with Maritana! Maybe I should listen to it. Is there a particular production or cast you'd recommend?

From:

cahn

Oh, I know what you mean about Nozze -- I feel the same way! And about G&S, though I have watched very little of it (I need to watch more!)

That is really interesting about Tales of Hoffmann, which I had no idea about! Lol, I wish I'd taken a bit longer with my nominations -- I went ahead and just nommed as in my post and they were approved before I read your comment (if I'd taken a bit more time, would probably have ditched one of my other fandoms and put in Met 2015 in addition to Hoffman-in-general, because I think both takes are fascinating). I remember looking up stuff when I watched it and realizing they did the performance order in a different order than other productions, but I didn't know about Nicklausse/Muse (or the lack thereof, rather). Met 2015 is the only production I've watched, so I'm sure I have a skewed view. I suppose if anyone requests then I'll have to watch more versions :D

Oh man, I watched your links and both Van Dam and Morris are great. I also totally love seeing singers I know but in a totally different context -- Van Dam I'd seen as Filippo, and Morris as Wotan, so I got a kick out of seeing them do extremely fun Villains. (The Van Dam is Le conseiller Lindorf, btw, but I love that part too :D ) Wow, Van Dam's voice. And Morris' too (although his slapstick was so hilarious that it kept distracting me from his gorgeous voice). (Hampson is just always so great and he's a great musician, but one can tell his voice is also getting older in that production, much as I hate to say it.)

but it does have a forward stating very firmly that the four villains are the same, the four love interests are the same, and Nicklausse is the Muse. :D

Heeee. But the four love interests are played by different women! That makes... less sense to me viscerally, although admittedly some amount of sense in the meta way.

From:

zdenka

I might see if I can find a video of a Met 2015 production -- I'd like to see more of what they did with it.

I'm glad you liked those clips! I'm confused by the Van Dam scene being different, because it's definitely the Coppelius scene when I click on the link! The ways of Youtube are mysterious. Hee, yes, it's always fun seeing singers in very different roles.

I asked my mother if she knew anything about the Nicklausse thing, and she pulled out an old LP of Hoffmann that had Beverly Sills singing all four love interests! So apparently it's been done at least once. But my understanding is the women's roles are really meant for different voice types, so I'd be surprised if it was done *often*. And each of the villains has the same entrance music, while the women's music is each different in tone. So yeah, the four women are the same, because they're all Stella, but also they aren't, and argh, I've confused myself now. But the opera does have these different layers of reality . . . Like, Lindorf *probably* isn't really an evil sorcerer, but who knows. :P

From:

cahn

Ha, I don't suppose your parents are members of Met on Demand? :D

I gotta say that -- as you could probably tell from the excerpts -- as often happens, the Met production could do with basically 100% fewer scantily clad ladies randomly scattered around. But I really loved how fun it was with the main characters -- Grigolo-Hampson-Lindsey are just marvelous -- especially with the Villains and Muse/Nicklausse (who is very obviously both), and how they were both always very aware of each other -- sometimes they seemed like antagonists, sometimes like allies in a way (they both want him to dump the girl), and sometimes like supernatural colleagues who are the only ones in the room who notice there;s something weird about the two of them. It's not a big deal (there's always a lot of other stuff going on, of course!) but it's definitely there. On the other hand it's probably just Hampson and Lindsey being awesome, because I watched half of the same production but with a different Villains (though still with Lindsey) and there wasn't any of that interplay >:< Also, I have a giant crush on Kate Lindsey now :) (to go with the giant crush I already had on Hampson, I guess) (sorry, Grigolo, you were really good but... you are also a tenor)

So yeah, the four women are the same, because they're all Stella, but also they aren't, and argh, I've confused myself now. But the opera does have these different layers of reality . . . Like, Lindorf *probably* isn't really an evil sorcerer, but who knows. :P

I mean, wouldn't that make a great fic? I'm just saying! :D

Edited (I can't type, I meant the *same* production, different singers) Date: 2021-06-15 03:51 am (UTC)

From:

zdenka

Sadly, no. But I can see what might be available through the local library systems or whatever.

They sound really great!

It would indeed. :D

From:

cahn

:D I see this morning that there are Met 2015 characters in the Contes tagset! Thank you! :D

(and Gluck and Arabella! And more Shakespeare! :D )

From:

zdenka

I correctly guessed that I'd be too indecisive to use all my slots anyway. :D I wasn't entirely sure what you meant by "La Muse & Dapertutto etc." so I put "La Muse & the Four Villains" -- I hope that's either what you wanted or close to it. :)

The Shakespeare wasn't me, but I'm looking forward to seeing what else shows up in the tag set! Oh, I wonder if I should have nommed Berlioz's Beatrice et Benedict . . . eh, too late now, but I definitely have no shortage of options. I remain indecisive, but there's already an embarrassment of riches in the tag set for me to request and offer. :D

From:

cahn

"La Muse & the Four Villains" -- I hope that's either what you wanted or close to it. :)

Yes, exactly right! I was just in a hurry when I nominated and couldn't figure out how to phrase it properly.

This tag set is like my dream tag set, look at all that lovely opera and theatre and musicals in there :D (I love books too, but I feel like it's easier to get tag sets with lots of books I like in it.)