Intermezzo 3: die Fledermaus

"I bloody hate Classic FM." Any performance, especially a classic, that starts with that phrase is worth an award. After 9 days of Operadagen, watching 6 shows and writing 2 reviews, it would be wrong to leave out my opinion on the funniest thing I've seen all week. Make that all year.
Die Fledermaus by Johann Straus jr, performed by Opera Della Luna is a gem. Luckily it was nothing like I expected. When I found out it was 2.5 hours, I allready planned my escape during intermission. I anticipated 150 minutes of non-stop opera-singing on a folding chair. But nothing of the sort, it was an operette, which is more like a funny musical, or in this case a good old British soap-opera. Even the red pluche love seat tip-up seats weren't too uncomfortable.
Back to the stage where a group of well-trained singers are dancing, acting and singing their asses off. The story is funny and contemporary, it's hard to believe that it was written in 1874. Well, the original version anyway, because I'm pretty sure they didn't have Brad Pitt, X-factor, Versace and text-messages back then. Stale marriage, rehab-clinics, parties, medling ex-lovers, revenge and jealousy are of all ages, and those are the key ingredients of die Fledermaus.
The stage changes three time in accordance to the three acts; from a tigerprint filled livingroom of the Eisenstein family, through a polarbear-infused partyroom at Orlofsky's to the psychedelic office space of Dr Frank, head of the rehab clinic.
The story is too long, twisty-turny to explain here, but imagine this scene: two Brits, pretending to be French, bothering the public by walking right through the audience and having the following conversation:
- it's magnifique,
- it's terrafique,
- it's, how we the Parisians say, 'periferique'
When they notice the uptitles (instead of subtitles) on the closed curtains they refer to the rehabcenter (afkick kliniek) as 'asskick clinic' and you can go there with alcohol, cocaine and translation problems. To me, that's class. The show is every alcoholics wet dream, since a lot of the songs sing to the praise of Pinot Noir, or even better, Champagne. Champagne is the always the answer, according to die Fledermaus. Looking at the Della Luna's tourlist, Rotterdam was the odd one out in a whole list of British based towns, this makes it extra special. This was awesome. Encore! Champagne!

Intermezzo 2: review Vivaldi LP2

Here's a little secret; I like Vivaldi's four seasons. I got through a large part of my examperiods during my social work studies on Vivaldi and other classics. Cause there are some things Rage Against the Machine, Live, Alanis Morrisette and Pearl Jam can't help you with, while Nigel Kennedy on violin can. So when I was asked to once more escort the ITI-group to the Las Palmas 2 to attend a performance called 'Caged Vivaldi; the Four Seasons, but different', I thought, "Why not?".

Well, here's why not. Sometimes you need to leave things alone. Summer, Autumn, Winter and Spring are fine as they were.
Just as I started to wonder, what exactly is different in this show, a guy sat down behind the piano and started 'playing' it. Now I am not a musician (repeat: NOT a musician), but I do know when I want to run for earplugs. This was it. It sounded horrible, like a 2-year old hitting random keys with a toycar. Accompanying it with dancers/actors who pretend to be the appointed season didn't help either, although Eric de Kuyper was his charming grandpa-self. After autumn, I couldn't help but thinking, 'Oh lord. Two more seasons'. The violinist and harpsichord (thanks Google Translate, it's criminal, but the English word for klavecimbel still isn't household-material) made up for the piano-bits. I especially enjoyed the dramatic bits from summer and winter, the ones usually know for their commercial purposes.
At one point it got so bad, I started having imaginary conversations with the bearded guy next to me. I talk during tv-shows, films, etcetera, very bad habit. One group of friends almost banned me from their tuesday cinema activities and threatened to sit elsewhere.
Me: "if this was a movie, I'd fall asleep"
Bearded guy: "please don't. I'm yawning too"
Me: "I could be in bed right now, watching Dexter"
Bearded guy: "cool, what season are you in?"
Me: "It's still autumn... I mean 3, episode 9. Miguel is going crazy"
Beraded guy: -spoiler alert-
After a while, I couldn't contain myself anymore and actually started whispering in his direction.
Me: "I feel like giving up my seat for this old guy pretending to be Winter"
Bearded guy: "I think it's part of the show"
Me: "we should play along. Do you think he can improvise?"
Bearded guy giggles a bit and shakes his head before staring back to the light blue harpsichord. (I like using the word harpsichord, lord knows when the next opportunity will be to use the word harpsichord.)

When the best part of an evening is the conversation that happened mainly in your head, it's a no-go. Vivaldi is like going to H&M, solid and nice, you know what you're gonna get. It never get's old, even after almost 300 years. But if you want to listen to it, just put on a Nigel Kennedy cd or search it on Spotify. The piano bits and the Cage (4 seating areas, divided by curtains, where the public moved into after each season) did not add anything to the show. If anything, it derogated my Vivaldi-experience.

Intermezzo - review The Air We Breathe

If you are a loyal reader, you were probably expecting the final stories on my journey to Russia. Sorry, that's up next, sometimes life happens in between me and my blog-plans.
This week I was lucky enough to land a temporary paid job at the Operadays (Operadagen) in Rotterdam as box-office employee / informationpoint ("I'm so sorry, but for these tickets you have to go the REAL box-office on your left"). A paid job includes a well-needed routine and the added bonus is that I'm being fed (dinner at cafe Floor for a week). And off course, I get to see some performances.

Yesterday I went to 'The Air We Breathe'. It was a total guess, because a) opera is not my genre, b) the poster doesn't give much clues on what to expect and c) the review in the festival-paper wasn't much of a help either.
The plan to cycle to the Maassilo alone was interrupted when the organisation needed someone to go on the bus with a group of guests who travelled especially to Rotterdam for the Operadagen-festival. Sure, I'll do it. Someone whispers to me that they are important. I'll keep that in mind, but if you have a group of people on a bus, it doesn't matter if they are 10-year-olds going on a schooltrip or ITI-vips on their way to a theatre.

We arrived a bit too late due to traffic. Pleasantly unexpected, the performance starts as soon as you walk into the catacombic cellars of the Maassilo. It's damp and the concrete walls are dimly lit. All of us sit spread around an area that reminds me of children in a playground-sandbox; scattered yet together. To my surprise the audience is expected to sing along. This is fun. It reminds me of Ben Folds' Army, so I like the idea of a capella audience-involvement. (watch and wait for it, 2:32). The singing does distract me from listening to the real talents though.
The storyline escapes me, but that's not the point of opera anyway, it's the emotion that counts. Ninety minutes of praising sounds, tunes, singing and vocal chords was a bit too long, I think. I'm not the only one; at 20:55 the first guy gives up and leaves his platform. It's around this time that I'm getting confused on whether to sing 'hoo aa ooo' or 'hoe whaaa hoe'. Than a young, happy chap catches my eye, and I realise it's Merlijn Twaalfhoven. I just got conducted by Merlijn Twaalfhoven! The Air we Breathe is full of little surprises, mainly in the shape of fellow audience members who turn out to be a part of it, when they stand up from their clique and sing their socks of. All of a sudden the huge amount of people make sense, because I know how many persons we should have inside according to ticketsales.
The next 'aha' moment is when I spot the light-projection that's moving on the white curtains; they remind me of clouds passing by. Now take a look at that poster.
Being here is like lying in a field (gras, yellow flowers, sandbox), watching clouds and doing nothing more but breathing.
This is probably why I come out of the Maassilo incredibly mellow. I had had a tough day. Rotterdam can be extremely depressing on a rainy day in may. Especially when you've been looking for a job for two months and just catalogued your 19 rejections. Sometimes all you need is a tourbus full of foreigners and an enthousiastic busdriver with a microphone to sprinkle some Rotterdam=magic-dust in your eyes. Top this off with a beautifull performance (read: sound-experience) and you're good to go again.

Why should you go see this: The performance is really special and seeing Merlijn Twaalfhoven live in action is worth so much more than 16 euro. The Maassilo is awesome and 'the Air We Breathe' makes opera approachable. I left the show completely calm and Zen. The ITI-group was enthousiastic too, I also got them home safe and sound.
Why not: 90 minutes is a bit long, but we accidentally solved that problem by being a bit too late.
Go see and experience for yourself.