Program – A Night at the Oper(ett)a.
Accompanist – Jason Wirth.
Monmouth Civic Chorus. This was taken after the first half of the program.
The program consisted mostly of songs from operettas
written by Gilbert & Sullivan, and the opera Dido and Aeneas by
Purcell. For good measure the Hebrew Chorus
from Nabucco and The Humming Chorus from Madama Butterfly, as well as The
Flower Duet from Lakme were thrown in the mix.
We just heard the Hebrew Chorus about a week ago, in
Leipzig. While I enjoyed it very much, I
thought their volume could be a bit louder.
The song sounds simple enough, and the voices often sang in unison. Given what I heard this afternoon, I realized
that perhaps it wasn’t that simple. I
find this Verdi aria to be always compelling, but do wish the delivery to be more
“professional,” for lack of a better word.
I thought the pianist did a good job imitating an orchestra.
The other song that was clearly out of the musicians’
league was the Flower Duet. When
performed well (or engineered well, since all I have heard are recordings), the
song has this sublime quality to it, in this case we just have two ladies struggling
to get to the notes, as well as get the French right.
The third well-known piece was the Humming Chorus from
Butterfly. Generally well-done, except
perhaps the tempo was a bit too fast. We
are talking about Butterfly and Suzuki spending the night waiting for Pinkerton
and the unfolding of the subsequent tragic events.
Giving credit where it is due, I really enjoyed the
tongue-twisting “Modern Major-General” from “The Pirates of Penzance.” It was expertly delivered, with the syllables
coming out cleanly.
As far as I could tell, “regular” MCC members were used
for the solo and ensemble parts, and I was quite impressed with the depth of
talent on display this afternoon.
The by-line of MCC is “Close to Perfect, Close to Home.” Not that far from the truth, but I think it perhaps
should be changed to “Close to Close to Perfect, Close to Home.” Given not even the professional organizations
are perfect, there is no shame in that.
We again went with the Homs, and had dinner at Sichuan
Cottage in Marlboro afterwards.
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