We had a 35 singer day - from 11 to 6. And as always I am never satisfied. For some reason I expect them all to be marvelous - talk about a triumph of hope over experience! But nevertheless there were more than a few good moments and it was a pleasure again to be with my fellow jury member, Ute Trekel Burkhardt, a distinguished mezzo from a different time who is now a successful teacher as well as the mother of one of the Berlin Staatsoper's most valued principal singers - Roman Trekel. We have another 40 or so tomorrow so these two days will have been wearing.
But we had a nice lunch break - and as these things happen it was at a propitious time as I had a really nice encounter with our former Chicago colleague Daniel Barenboim in the Opera Cafe just beside the Staatsoper. He has a Parsifal performance tomorrow afternoon at 4pm, with Roman Trekel incidentally as Amfortas - but its too early for us to get there. I think that I will in any case be whacked out by 6pm and even then might not make it for Act 2.
Meanwhile Berlin continues, even after 18 years since the wall came down, to be a construction site. I wonder what St Hedwig would have thought about her Cathedral being a promo opportunity for the iPod. There is the Staatsoper on the left.......look at the link to see what this should look like!
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