music to start the weekend

my headset broke again last week.. so i picked up this cool thing which arrived last night ready for some testing + new music:

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So, I’ve sat through 6+ hours of Cecilia Bartoli and have come to a conclusion: she can do _anything_ she wants with her voice! and she does EVERYTHING she wants with a purpose! the phrasing is absolutely intuitive! (from the listening point-of-view, haven’t watched any of these clips in details). Actually it sort of started when i sat through 3 of her albums 2 weeks ago. Think i’ve figured out, for her singing i really want a non-stop run instead of piece by piece to hear the entire range of emotions she can cover. Last night the new headset got the first test-drive with this piece** actually, which i and dehggial had a short conversation a bit back regarding “over the top” vs “not doing enough“. There’s always something in a clip that makes me wanting less or more, think it’s toward the end of this one.. which prompted me to search everything she sung in “Juditha Triumphans” (not much!!! WHY NOT???) and promptly listening to the ENTIRE recital in Paris <—- ABSOLUTELY GREAT, very much like!! afterward was “live in Italy” with “Mozart” (above) lurking in corner of eye, and here we are. VERY MUCH like her mozart here. 40-minute is too SHORT! Have some serious fighting with “eddies” and “tides” this weekend, superb conditions for long hours of listening on gorgeous headset (very clear + crisp sound) with lots to catch up.

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(ps- oh Stray, many thanks for clip from last saturday! i sat through Act 1 too, GReAT singing!!)

** to aide interpretation of “over-the-top” vs “not enough”, here’s the context of the aria:

The mood switches to renewed militancy as the Bethulians are called to renewed vigilance in Vagaus’s aria “Armatae face et anguibus,” a “rage” piece summoning images of snakes, “dread companions”, and violent death.

What did she do differently than Roberta Invernizzi? i can’t really tell except somehow it just *felt* right and that it works! 🙂 (how’s that for subjective + vague explanations, i once had a math prof who wrote an equation on the board and a solution! 1/2 of the 100-student class, myself included, raised our hands asking “how do you get that solution”?? he looked completely perplexed: “i just know it! if you don’t know… you’re not an engineer!”)

Edit: felt like this poor guy everytime this piece ends 😀 (was flying in my apartment night before, then some vicious wrestling from the cat overnight and outcome, poor thing)