E la mensa prepariamo con ricchezza e nobiltà

Five years after singing Mariage of Figaro with Opéra des Landes in 2018, the timing of my summer holiday this year allowed me to take part once more in the choruses of the Opéra des Landes for another of Mozart's Italian operas on a libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte: Cosi fan tutte. 

Just like in Figaro, the chorus only makes three short appearances on stage and one backstage. I had already sung the piece with Bangkok Opera in 2006, and the chorus was in desperate need of tenors. So I negotiated with the chorus master to let me sing the production with my joining only two rehearsals before the dress rehearsal. It worked! This is a recollection of what happened back- and off-stage.

This production had already been given in other cities and five of the six soloists had already worked with each other and the conductor. On the other hand, the lead tenor and the chorus were discovering the staging and we only had three days to learn our roles and actions on stage. On the day of the dress rehearsal, the props for the stage were still being set up by the stage technicians while the artists were rehearsing on stage.

The trickiest part for everyone was that in the small theatre of Soustons there is no orchestra pit. Therefore, the small ensemble of musicians is always put on one side of the stage and the conductor is also on the far-side. This was problematic for many of us because the stage setting in this production involved an inner central box into which all people on stage had to turn their gaze. When deep inside the box, or on its outside, it was difficult or even impossible to see the conductor. Thus, many of us had to sing by ear and sometimes get off-time, or turn our head towards the conductor but then we would be told off by the stage directors for not looking into the central box! To help out, the stage technicians installed a loudspeaker hidden behind a curtain on the opposite side of the stage from the musicians so that singers on that outer side could hear the music more clearly and in time.

At the dress rehearsal the last change of costume for the two men soloists inevitably did not work out as planned: they failed to metamorphose themselves back from Albanians to Italians in the only two minutes they had backstage. So they cheated by wearing their Western trousers and shirt under their Oriental embroidered livery and turban. They also kept their Oriental shoes on for the final scene. However, given that the whole costume colour scheme was off-white, the audience probably did not spot these details.

All in all, we all had lots of fun and the two shows were close to sold out with a total of 800 people coming to see us and enjoy the show. You can read a French musical critic's viewpoint and see photos of all of us on stage here, and see some film footage of the dress rehearsal taken by the local TV channel here.

Cosi fan tutte
Wolfgang A. Mozart, Chamber orchestra of Europe, Sir Georg Solti, Decca

On England's pleasant pastures seen

I used to take regular trips to the UK at least once a year. I enjoy its green countryside and usually cheerful folk in small cities and rural areas. Going through my previous articles in this blog, I realise my last trip to the UK was in April 2019. Covid put a stop to my international travelling for several years.

Now that it is again possible to travel easily in and out of China, I took a summer holiday to Europe and went for a nine-day, three-Nations tour of England, Wales and Scotland. I had announced my trip to all the friends whose email address I had and who were based or had a connection with the UK, giving them the choice of meeting place in either London, Monmouth (Wales), Manchester or Edinburgh when I was passing by. Unfortunately, the dates of my trip also coincided with summer holidays in the UK so many of my friends were away too. I only got to meet two of my friends and their spouse. I thus spent the rest of my time visiting new places, trekking or running along well-signed footpaths, enjoying the new British gastro-scene and shopping for new clothes and textile items.

In the past I had always driven around the UK as a car is the easiest way to reach out-of-the-way rural areas of outstanding beauty. This time I chose to take trains throughout my trip despite the threat of widespread industrial action. There was no disruption in the end. I only had a tight change of platform in Birmingham on my way to Manchester because of the late arrival of my first train from Gloucester. For once, all the photos in the article are selfies in different places along my tour.

I started off with a night and half-day in London where it was as busy as ever although I tried to stay away from the major tourist attractions. By 2pm it was really starting to get unpleasantly busy with tourists, so I took a train down to Kent. As none of my friends had expressed interest to meet me in London, I accepted the invitation of my friends Hannah and Tim to stay a few days with them in the smaller town of Otford. We enjoyed delicious food together. I went on a long and sunny five-hour walk along the North Downs Way and had to take two trains to find my way back to Otford.

I moved across the country from Kent to Wales for a few days with my former food marketing Professor David Hughes and his wife Susan. The weather started deteriorating but we still enjoyed delicious local meats and the vegetables Susan produced herself in her allotment. I got very cosy with their old cat Spartacus. I got baffled trying to read signs in Welsh.

From Wales, I made a stopover in Manchester, where I had never been before. The architecture of the city is very surprising: there is no consistent heighbourhood housing style. Each individual house has a style spanning from the 15th to the 21st century, whatever the style of its neighbouring houses. This creates a disconcerting kaleidoscope of a city. I took a long walk along a canal heading North of town; with all the locks they had to pass, I was walking faster than the long boats. 

I was thrilled to take a Trans-Pennine Express service North from Manchester to Edinburgh. We passed through beautiful countryside. The Scottish weather was unwelcoming for tourists: showers and sunny spells throughout my day in Edinburgh. I shopped my way along the Royal Mile for woolen textiles and souvenirs. I went to listen to evensong at Saint Mary's Cathedral. The choristers were sadly on summer holiday too; the music was artfully sung by a visiting choir from Texas. I got to taste Scottish tapas. It seems to be the latest food trend in fashionable urban centres: sharing several small portions of food set on the table for all. Rather than ordering a main dish each, the diners order several small dishes to share. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this trip back in the UK and hope to go back more regularly, choosing a base point to enjoy more of the local scene and greenery.

Jerusalem
Hubert Parry, Royal Choral Society

Summer days drifting away to those summer nights

My last week of June has been very busy getting all my work done before my summer vacation. I've also been very busy outside of work.

For the dragon boat festival long week-end, I travelled to Lanzhou for a few days of hiking along the Yellow River with Beijing Hikers. My highlight from this trip was the many colours and forms that the river took depending on the topography it flowed through. Despite its name, the Yellow River turned to blue in a lake created by a dam along its course. I was accompanied on this trip by the smiling handicapped mascot of the 2024 Paris Olympic games, a phryge. It looks like a red smurf hat and is a symbol of liberty. We shot lots of photos together as part of a promotional campaign to introduce the values of next year's Paris Olympic games to the Chinese netizens through a series of short stories on the Chinese Twitter-like Weibo platform of the mascots visiting various emblematic Chinese sites.

On Thursday 29 June I gave a solo recital of French Romantic melodies together with pianist Cheng Tong. After a trial recital last year which only attracted 8 people because of covid-phobia, this time I sang a full-length programme of 12 pieces in front of 44 people. For the first time, I realised the difficulty of singing live, solo and for a long time: one needs to deal with voice quality but also interact with the audience, say a few words of introduction before singing, keep going although the pianist and I realise to our horror we are no longer in synch... It was an exhausting learning experience. The audience nonetheless seemed to enjoy the show. I was fortunate to have lots of singing friends come to listen to me: I already have a group of fans in Beijing.

Finally, just before leaving China for France, I travelled to Taiyuan in Shanxi province to take part in the wedding ceremony of my French cousin Henri who had met and got married to a Chinese lady in France. This was the Chinese side of the wedding and I was the only representative from the French side. The ceremony was very colourful and well choreographed to maximise photo opportunities. The music was loud; the lights multicoloured and very bright; but the banquet was a delicious assortment of local Chinese delicacies.

It has been a tiring week, made all the more exhausting by the scorching temperatures reaching 40°C during the day over the last month. I am now glad to have left the heat of Northern China for the more temperate European weather for my three weeks of summer vacation. 

Summer nights
John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, original soundtrack from the motion picture Grease, 

Recital photos: Autumn and Katia Wistoff