#grimoaldo

mesto, infermo, il cor sen' giace, mà il suo mal così gli piace, che bramar pace non sa

( notes under cut )

met opera rodelinda blobs! ( and grimsquare )

this isn't an original idea, but it's still one i doubt many people would know, unless you inhabited a specific corner of the internet at a specific time.

individual blobs below! feel free to use them for whatever, with credit. :)

their contrast reminds me of some sort of bird species. somewhere in between ruffs and the birds-of-paradise of genus lophorina, i think.

( and maybe if we think about it a little harder, rodelinda vaguely resembles a tree swallow, with those colours and those sleeves. )

confusa si miri, l'infida consorte / ch' in faccia di morte così mi deride

el real midsummer night's dream opened last night. i opened the webpage then and found a singular photo with iestyn davies ( as oberon ) in it. opened it again this morning, and it was no longer there. weeeeird. the photos of liv redpath's ( absolutely gorgeous ) tytania are gone with it. regardless, i eagerly await the proshot.

looked into the karlsruhe handel festival, because i saw a clip from its tolomeo(!!!), though it was from a performance where tolomeo was played by cameron shahbazi rather than jjo ( and honestly, i prefer the former ). tried to navigate the venue's website to see if they had stuff on video ( and they have some seriously interesting handel prods + countertenor competition! ) but it's all in german. which i do not understand. Hilfe!

but i did get my hands on an audio recording of a different run of that tolomeo prod! the only cast member i care about there is giuseppina bridelli.

forgot about the recent akhnaten with john holiday at los angeles opera, which i'd been discussing with a friend off-site. they reminded me and showed me photos, and that led me on a little side-quest. i'd seen their nefertiti, sun-ly pierce, in met stuff and her artist bio mentioned her being bertarido(!!!) in rodelinda at the hudson opera house. however, i could find nothing about that production apart from that.

quick aside, on the topic of philip glass productions that have involved anthony roth costanzo at some point- still no new information about roles in paris satyagraha. i remain puzzled.

continuing my endeavours to learn all of grimoaldo's parts in rodelinda, and then some. "prigioniera ho l'alma in pena" is turning out to be the most difficult, surprisingly ( and frustratingly, because to me it's his most iconic aria ). many long phrases with no easy place to sneak in a breath. don't get me wrong, i'm still tripping over the coloratura in "tuo drudo è mio rivale" and "tra sospetti," but at least the movement of those ones make them less of an asphyxiation risk.

i am still obsessed with matteuccio. there's something oddly poignant about how his penultimate recorded role was that of the virgin mary.

hmm. much to consider.