In the Dark

I almost missed out on last night’s performance at the National Concert Hall in Dublin. I saw the details in the brochure when it arrived at the start of the season and marked the date in my diary but dithered about buying a ticket and when I did get round to trying a few weeks ago the concert was sold out. I kept checking on the website though and was fortunate enough to find that there were some returns, so I managed to get there after all.

Angela Gheorghiu is of course a celebrated Diva with a huge following around the world, so I should have known tickets would sell quickly. The foyers and bars of the National Concert Hall were as busy as I’ve ever seen them before a performance, and there was a bit of delay getting everyone into their seats at the start as it was so full.

Last night’s concert wasn’t the normal Friday night affair at the NCH. There were no microphones and no Paul Herriott on stage so I presume it wasn’t broadcast on RTÉ Lyric FM as the weekly concerts usually are, or even recorded. I guess there were contractual reasons for that. The National Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Ciprian Teodorașcu from Romania, as of course is the star of the show herself.

I thought Angela Gheorghiu took a little while to get into her stride, not helped by the tempo for the second number Che farò senza Euridice? which I thought was far too slow. By the time we got to Song to the Moon from Rusalka, however, she was in full flow; thereafter the concert just got better and better, especially after the wine break (which was after the Habanera from Carmen). Gheorghiu’s voice seems well suited to Puccini, and the two of his arias in the second half were particularly fine.

Angela Gheorghiu was not only in excellent voice but also looked every inch the glamorous operatic superstar we expected. In the first half she was dressed in a black dress with a plunging neckline and in the second in a blazing red gown. She established a huge rapport with the audience, making a point of turning around from time to time and singing to the folk in the choir stalls.

The concert was of standard operatic repertoire but I didn’t know what Parla più piano was until I read the programme notes: it’s the love them from The Godfather, usually sung in English as Speak Softly Love. The last time I heard that was at my Mother’s funeral. Can that really have been three years ago?

The performance was received very warmly indeed, with loud cheers and standing ovations. There were encores too, of course. I just knew the first would be an Irish song, and so it was – The Last Rose of Summer. The next was Puccini’s O mio babbino caro from Gianni Schicchi and the one after that was Granada, another standard component of the concert repertoire.

There may have been more encores, but I had to leave after three to get the train home after an unforgettable evening which was a much needed tonic after an exhausting week.

This entry was posted on October 15, 2022 at 11:13 am and is filed under Music with tags Angela Gheorghiu, Ciprian Teodorașcu, National Concert Hall, National Symphony Orchestra. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.