The occasion

cast | synopsis | previous posts: 1 2 3

From inside the house, I haven't yet noticed a difference between Met evenings with Sirius transmissions and those without. Whether it's too new, too common, or too narrow, the fact of an evening's going over satellite radio doesn't, apparently, affect the atmosphere. But the traditional Saturday afternoon radio broadcasts, whether now redundant or not, still seem to count for something: Saturday's season-last Idomeneo showed a remarkable unanimity of focus and inspiration. Despite at least one bashful cell-owner, it was the best opera performance I've seen all season.

Interestingly, even nit-pick issues I had that wouldn't have been noticed on radio -- e.g. Kozena's gestural overshoot and Rensberg's head-bobbing -- were largely corrected. It showed an attention to detail that didn't exclude, for the first time this run, concentration through each act so that each came as one long breath. What a change from Thursday's disappointment...