New Zealander Simon O’Neill is now one of the world’s leading Wagnerian tenors. And I bet most of you didn’t even know that.
Here he is singing “Wintersturme,” from Act I of Richard Wagner’s Die Walkure (part of Wagner’s famous “Ring Cycle”), sung at the 2008 Ravello Festival in Italy. The woman he’s making love to is the amazing Waltraute Meier; conducting him is Daniel Barenboim; and playing for him is the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra—an orchestra made entirely of musicians from both Israel and Palestine.
Not a bad place to be be for a boy from Ashburton.
(Another one-NZ-music-post-per-day for NZ Music Month.)
PS: Here’s Part 1 of a short doco on Simon done when he was understudying Placido Domingo at The Met a few years ago in the role he’s now singing around the world as lead. Naturally, it’s called ‘The Understudy.’
2 comments:
Yes, but it's not really music is it? Its more like an ugly shouting noise.... ugh. He might be one of the best in the world at making this hideous racket, but one had to ask oneself whether he wouldn't be more usefully employed in a trade like plumbing or something.
Dave Mann
Wow. Dave, I imagine plumbers (except the ones in Saudi Arabia) don't tend to earn $20k a night for turning up and making the "hideous racket".
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