papageno

"He's a man, but he's been hanging around birds so long, he looks like a bird." 

"So he's like a crazy cat lady, but with birds?"

heilige tugend

My, my, my, my, my.

I may have promised more than I can deliver!

In these sacred halls, tonight, there was no revenge - also no talking out of turn, pursuing of tangents, cracking of jokes, squabbling, or mayhem of any kind!

One hardly recognized us.

"Don't worry," our First Lady of Song assured me afterwards. "It's only the first class. They'll be misbehaving in no time."

In the meantime, tonight we accomplished an amazing feat: a Whirlwind Tour through the entire Magic Flute, with all the major arias and duets touched on, and pretty much all of the dialogue read.

We were treated to both of the Queen of the Night's arias, sung in full splendor by our uncontested Queen. We had a couple of different wonderful Papagenos. We are already envisioning him being covered in peacock feathers (donations of feathers, etc. are more than welcome).

And: we have a bass!

Friends, we are flush. Let's enjoy this moment.

* charade *

Good morning, friends!
It's a beautifully blustery one.

Why am I posting on a Thursday instead of a Wednesday? Because last night I was out having the perhaps once-in-a-lifetime treat of seeing one of my favorite movies on the big screen.

But next week the mayhem starts up again!

You will once again get to hear about Opera Scenes.
Better than any movie, this acting, singing, dancing class has got it all:

     - mystery
     - intrigue
     - conflict
     - comedy (lots and lots of comedy)
     - witty dialogue
     - lovable characters
     - happy endings

So come on along for the ride. Because, mesdames et messieurs, ici, l'attraction, c'est nous!
   

it's not over till...

There are easy days, and there are tough days.

Sometimes it's not clear why a day is one or the other.

It's not like people weren't perfectly nice to me, some even smiled when they saw me, some did me favors and said nice things to me.

And yet I was annoyed by the smallest things today. A man who kept yelling at me as I walked down the street. "Miss! Miss!" Persistent, rude.

A woman who tried to get me to do something, join her cause, a perfectly good cause, but one I did not at that moment want to join, and said something tactless, to which I answered something tactless back.

A disappearing bike lane.

Wegmans being out of Ben & Jerry's vanilla ice cream. And just out-and-out not carrying matches, the small ones anyway.

Is everyone in the world lighting their candles with lighters?

And then there were the small wonderful things. A friend's silly accent making me laugh. A kind voice on the phone in the middle of the day. Being reunited with my instrument after having it in the shop. Singing.