The Girl of the Golden West

Lyric Opera of Chicago

We saw this several weeks ago now, and it wasn't incredibly remarkable, so I didn't run back and write it up.

Pretty much every time we go to Lyric, I have to complain about my seats. Same complaint, my seats are around $50 each and we can barely hear a thing. We can barely hear the message about cell phones. I'm willing to sit in the cheap seats - I just want them to be cheap. And, these aren't. They are bad and expensive. So, I'm having a really, really hard time figuring out whether to resubscribe next year. It's so much money, to be so unsatisfied. Do I pay more for better? Although it costs a lot more to get not a lot better, or do I just give up and fly to New York or Houston or San Fran for my opera and just skip Chicago all together? Decisions...

So, about the Golden Girl, who was, in this case, Deborah Voigt. Usually, I avoid operas with one of Lyric's favorite sopranos. But, I hadn't seen this opera before, and I thought maybe my memory had gotten fuzzy or I had just been too picky. Nope, this just isn't my favorite soprano. She's a good musician with a nice, big voice, don't get me wrong. I just don't like her instrument. It has a tendency to go shrill. And, the timbre just hits my ear wrong. I assume she must be absolutely wonderful to work with, consistent, friendly, etc. - because the jobs roll in for her. But, I think I'll continue to avoid her after this. It's just not worth it.

The two male stars were very good: Marcello Giordani and Jack Rance. Both singers were strong with lovely voices. It's such a male opera, generally, and that's really nice. I guess not unlike Boheme, in some ways, as there are tons of men and one central female character.

The sets were nice, although the architectural structures were a little under size for the stage. It was perhaps to create intimacy or something, but they were a bit out of scale for that huge stage and that huge theater.

The lecture, as always, was great. It's been my favorite part of Lyric, going to the lectures.

Well, we have one more opera to go to this year and then we'll make our decision about next. It hasn't been a great year, actually. Mikado was okay, but that was the strongest offering so far and operetta as your strongest opera offering isn't stellar. And, next year already I'm looking most forward to hearing Nathan Gunn in...Showboat. I mean, c'mon. I'd rather hear him in a real opera. The season next year looks much like the season this year, I could either go to all of them or none of them and feel about the same.

Well, here's hoping that Handel will wow me. Doubt it, but maybe. I didn't expect to be blown away by Alcina in Milan, so you never know. We'll see, Lyric.