You Can See All Too Well
There’s a price to pay for the incredible visual clarity of a Blu-ray opera played on a large LED TV: you see lots of distractions in the close-ups. Early in Lohengrin, one of the king’s officials sang so forcefully that he sprayed gobs of spit on the stage. During her most intense, lengthy aria, rivulets of sweat ran down the cheeks, hair, and ears of Dorothea Roschmann, the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro. At one point, I think I saw Rolando Villazon’s tonsils vibrate in one of his despairing arias in La Traviata. And for “The Berlin Concert,” his hair looked like it was curled with the gooiest gel in town. At the Baden-Baden Opera Gala, when Ludovic Tezier sang, you couldn't see his upper teeth; all that was visible was his very yellow bottom teeth. Even Anna Nebtreko isn’t picture perfect. I noticed some large pores on her neck during her performance during that same Gala.
As I get used to my home theater, I will probably overlook these superficialities and concentrate more fully on the dramatic interaction of the characters and the glorious sound.
There’s a price to pay for the incredible visual clarity of a Blu-ray opera played on a large LED TV: you see lots of distractions in the close-ups. Early in Lohengrin, one of the king’s officials sang so forcefully that he sprayed gobs of spit on the stage. During her most intense, lengthy aria, rivulets of sweat ran down the cheeks, hair, and ears of Dorothea Roschmann, the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro. At one point, I think I saw Rolando Villazon’s tonsils vibrate in one of his despairing arias in La Traviata. And for “The Berlin Concert,” his hair looked like it was curled with the gooiest gel in town. At the Baden-Baden Opera Gala, when Ludovic Tezier sang, you couldn't see his upper teeth; all that was visible was his very yellow bottom teeth. Even Anna Nebtreko isn’t picture perfect. I noticed some large pores on her neck during her performance during that same Gala.
As I get used to my home theater, I will probably overlook these superficialities and concentrate more fully on the dramatic interaction of the characters and the glorious sound.