turandot
turandot
Joined: 12/31/69
turandot#0
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:20ami saw the opera turandot tonight. it was FANTASTIC!!! wonderful voices. but the lady playing turandot was uh...suprisingly heavy. anyone seen this show?
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/28/04
re: turandot#2
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:28am
Great opera. Puccini's last (he died composing it -- the final duet was completed by Franco Alfano, a colleague). Though Turandot is supposed to be a teenager, the intense demands of "In Questa Reggia" and the final duet dictate that a strong dramatic soprano has to play it and those voices tend to be attached to rather "large" women. While it's only 25 minutes of singing (Birgit Nilsson the great Wagnerian soprano use to call it her "party role"), it's quite a formidable challenge for most singers.
Did you see it at the Met? The Zefferelli production is eye-popping.
Joined: 12/31/69
re: turandot#3
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:33amno it was a local opera house.... in wilmington delaware. but it was beautiful! i thought the girl playing liu was much better than the girl playing turandot!
re: turandot#4
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:34am
First opera I ever saw as well.... back in elementary school. 
re: turandot#5
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:36amTurandot is a MUCH harder role (any decent lyric soprano can sing Liu). If Liu upstaged Turandot then that must have been a REALLY MESSED UP production.
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/28/04
re: turandot#6
Posted: 10/31/04 at 12:36am
I saw the Orlando Opera Company version about 6 years back
it was a beautiful production
and our liu was magnificient
re: turandot#7
Posted: 10/31/04 at 8:35amLiu often upstages Turandot simply because she's such a sympathetic character and has such beautiful music to sing. Puccini stopped writing the opera - and never completed it - at the end of Liu's death scene. He was emotionally attached to her - as he was to all his heroines - and couldn't carry on. Throat cancer did him in soon after.
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/3/04
re: turandot#8
Posted: 10/31/04 at 10:31amI don't know Margo. It seems like every time I see Turandot (my fav opera -- I'm a Puccini schmuck), I get more into Liu than Turandot -- I think it's mostly that she gets that great suicide scene, and she's the forgotten love...and TUrandot is the ice princess...we just wanna root for her, not Turandot. Couple that with my general distaste of big, wobbly voices (save Joan Sutherland, who's Turandot made me cry) and you've got a recipe for Liu stealing the show every time.
Broadway Star Joined: 5/22/04
re: turandot#9
Posted: 10/31/04 at 2:11pm
Wow, I absolutely love Turandot! It was the first opera I was ever in. Actually, I am listening to Act 2 right now. It's my favorite act of any opera ever. It's really an amazing show. Did you see it performed in Italian or English?
The person who was Liu when I did it had UNBELIEVABLE breath control, and she was so nice. My little brothers (one's 7, the other is 10) both cried during her death scene. I think Liu's part is very demanding and difficult, although it's hard to say it's harder than Turandot's.
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/15/03
re: turandot#10
Posted: 10/31/04 at 2:18pmThe Met's current production of TURANDOT is breathtaking! Turandot's palace is one of the most gorgeous sets I've ever seen on any stage--and the costumes are incredible, too. Rumor has it that they ran out of beads for all the women's headdresses and Zeffirelli made an urgent call to the Vatican gift shop. They provided him with hundreds of aqua rosaries that were adapted to the costumes.
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