Hot date...
Jun. 28th, 2012 12:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snousle...with, would you believe it, my husband. Don't all die of shock, now, we are occasionally seen in public together. This time, we went to see the SF Opera's production of Nixon in China, which I've wanted to see ever since I put the CD into the player for the first time and had my mind suitably blown by the experience.
Anyway, we started with an extravagant dinner: the seven course tasting menu at Jardinere, conveniently close to the SF opera house. Really good - not overwrought, but delicious and beautiful. A couple of courses featured foie gras, probably the last time we'll be eating it in California until after the revolution. :-P I particularly liked their interpretation of smoked brisket - very homey and down to earth, quite a contrast to the earlier, more etherial courses that are typical of their cuisine.
They always ask if you're seeing a performance, and we duly responded that we were, at 8PM. We started at 5, but it was obvious by about 7:15, that they were going to have to hustle a little bit if we were to get out in time. Good thing I prodded them, since although we were only a block away, we weren't in our seats for more than three minutes before the lights dimmed and the music started.
I had spent some time listening to the opera beforehand while driving around the PNW. I have to say, the performance was MUCH more interesting than the recording had led me to expect. Four hours never went by so fast. As I had suspected, the CD doesn't make a whole lot of sense until you see the stage production. Being of the modernist variety, the opera has no plot as such, just an un-ordered sequence of words and images. Historical fact overlaps freely with the private imaginings of the characters, as if in a particularly jumbled dream. It's also quite funny at parts, and I was blown away by the minimalist beauty of some of the sets.
Adams' music gets into your brain and reprograms it in slightly alarming ways. The intensity of it makes me feel a little panicked sometimes, as if I'm being abducted by space aliens. It's a little strange having what seems like a train wreck of random notes fall into order and become not just sensible, but inevitable.
I hear he's working on a series of follow-up operas: first, a "pre-quel" of sorts, titled "LBJ in Vietnam", followed by "Carter in Egypt", "Bush in Japan", "Obama in Kenya", "Reagan in Outer Space", and finally, "Clinton in Monica".
Anyway, we started with an extravagant dinner: the seven course tasting menu at Jardinere, conveniently close to the SF opera house. Really good - not overwrought, but delicious and beautiful. A couple of courses featured foie gras, probably the last time we'll be eating it in California until after the revolution. :-P I particularly liked their interpretation of smoked brisket - very homey and down to earth, quite a contrast to the earlier, more etherial courses that are typical of their cuisine.
They always ask if you're seeing a performance, and we duly responded that we were, at 8PM. We started at 5, but it was obvious by about 7:15, that they were going to have to hustle a little bit if we were to get out in time. Good thing I prodded them, since although we were only a block away, we weren't in our seats for more than three minutes before the lights dimmed and the music started.
I had spent some time listening to the opera beforehand while driving around the PNW. I have to say, the performance was MUCH more interesting than the recording had led me to expect. Four hours never went by so fast. As I had suspected, the CD doesn't make a whole lot of sense until you see the stage production. Being of the modernist variety, the opera has no plot as such, just an un-ordered sequence of words and images. Historical fact overlaps freely with the private imaginings of the characters, as if in a particularly jumbled dream. It's also quite funny at parts, and I was blown away by the minimalist beauty of some of the sets.
Adams' music gets into your brain and reprograms it in slightly alarming ways. The intensity of it makes me feel a little panicked sometimes, as if I'm being abducted by space aliens. It's a little strange having what seems like a train wreck of random notes fall into order and become not just sensible, but inevitable.
I hear he's working on a series of follow-up operas: first, a "pre-quel" of sorts, titled "LBJ in Vietnam", followed by "Carter in Egypt", "Bush in Japan", "Obama in Kenya", "Reagan in Outer Space", and finally, "Clinton in Monica".
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no subject
Date: 2012-06-28 10:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-30 03:43 pm (UTC)https://dl.dropbox.com/u/5154414/06%20Track%206%20-%20News.mp3
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/5154414/10%20Track%2010%20-%20Founders%20Come%20First%2C%20Then%20Profiteers.mp3
no subject
Date: 2012-06-29 02:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-29 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-29 12:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-29 02:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-30 07:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-30 01:00 am (UTC)Oh yeah, your pre-opera dinner sounded really great!