mike wrote:
>(george london recorded the part of mandryka in 'arabella' taking
>unauthorized options. 'what was the point?', i wonder.)
I'm not familiar with this particular recording, nor with this role,
nor with this opera, but I suppose it depends how you view the
"point" of a role. The range? The notes? The acting challenges?
The message a particular character brings to the work as a whole?
The chance to work with a conductor or director or colleague whom one
admires? The money? The chance to enhance ones recorded legacy?
Are you acquainted with the concept of open score & closed score?
It's a terminology I've picked up in my work in new music theatre.
Open scores are those whose notation leaves room for interpretation
-- lead sheets, aleatory works, da capo sections of Baroque arias.
Closed scores are those whose notation is very specific -- many
Elliott Carter scores, for example. You can think of it as a
continuum, though. Most scores are somewhere in the middle. It
occurs to me that even opera scores are more open than we often
define them as being. Yet classically-trained singers (and
instrumentalists to a certain degree) have it drummed into our skulls
that the printed page is inviolate. I find that more often than not,
it's a road map rather than being the road itself.
(Yes, mike, I'm aware I just used your rhetorical question to launch
an entirely different discussion! I hope you'll forgive me!)
Naomi Gurt Lind
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