I don’t often watch New Year’s Day concerts on television (or computer), but lots of people veer toward the version from Vienna, perhaps drawn by the irresistible, fatal lure of the “Radetzky March.”
This year, though, we were keen to see the concert from La Fenice, live via streaming, and apart from the music itself, I was entertained by observing all the measures the orchestra and chorus had taken to maintain distancing and otherwise limit contact in the decidedly closed area of the theatre. I checked them off, mentally, as from some viral bingo card. Masks, of course, though the inevitably maskless wind and brass players were separated by plexiglas panels. The chorus wore masks, which didn’t seem to affect the quality of the singing but must have been somewhat challenging where breathing was concerned. (Not to mention the drippage that masks inevitably call forth.) The next day it was sharply noted by many that the musicians of the Vienna concert had not worn masks.
Making space for everybody meant that the entire orchestra section of the theater was stripped of its pink velvet armchairs and covered with a platform. (Some of the armchairs were moved to the stage for the benefit of the singers.) I’d like some expert to explain how this repositioning might have affected the overall acoustics. I didn’t notice any particular problem.
Lack of an audience threatened depressing intervals of silence between the numbers, but it turned out that the performers applauded each other — the chorus clapped for the orchestra or soloists; the orchestra stamped their feet and the string players also tapped their music stands with their bows. The conductor clapped for everybody. It was perfect.
Naturally the program was entirely composed of old warhorses, and we love them all. This is one moment in the year when rash experiments in music are neither needed nor wanted.
The reason I’m mentioning all this is because someone had the charming idea to complement the “Barcarolle” from The Tales of Hoffman with a ride through the canals aboard a gondola. Even if you don’t care about music, old or equine, I wanted you to experience this sensation, partly because it has become sadly rare these days, and partly because these few waterborne moments give the most expressive glimpse of the city as she is at the moment that I’ve ever seen. I suppose it was filmed early on a Sunday, because although the taxis and gondolas have almost disappeared, the barges on workdays are still going full tilt. But the sense of emptiness, in canals and along many streets, has become all too common.
Among my many hopes for the New Year is one in particular: To see the city full of gondolas again, slipping through the maze of Venetian waterways. With or without Hoffman.
(Apologies for the quality of these clips; I couldn’t find any better. But they show the organization of the concert, and the music itself is wonderful, as always.)
14 Comments
Dear Erla thanks for the magic!!!
I just pass it along, there’s still plenty for everybody.
I miss you both so much. I will be on a plane as soon as my passport becomes valid!
We’ll be here waiting for you! Happy New Year, wherever you are in the meantime.
Thank you for that glimpse.
‘To see the city full of gondolas again!’
What a thrill that would be, even if it meant hearig to a hundred leather-lunged renditions of ‘Santa Lucia’ and, heaven help us, ‘Volare’ as they glide along the Canal at twilight.
Among my most fervent wishes is to spend my next birthday, as I did the last Big One, ensconced in gilt and velvet in a box just beneath the ceiling at LaFenice. After lunch in Castello with a friend not seen often enough.
I second your wishes and look forward to your coming back, birthday or no. As do the gondoliers!
Thank you so very much for your posts but especially for the New Year’s concert. What a lot of extra effort was put forth to make that happen. Stay well.
Louisa in Dover, NH, USA
I’m glad you thought of how much work went into it. Thanks for writing to recognize that! Stay well.
Happy New Year, Erla! I loved the concert. RaiPlay has it on demand. People can register for free to watch it at http://www.raiplay.it -> https://www.raiplay.it/programmi/concertodicapodannolafenice2021
Cat Bauer recently posted..Happy New Year 2021 – The Ancient Majesty of Venice – The 14th Quaderno & Four Columns of the San Pietro Portal
Good to know, thanks for sharing. And Happy New Year back to you!
Erla, Great post, I liked the gondola ride, something you would never experience in a normal Venice. I thought the chorus with masks a bit muted but likely appropriate for the passing year I have been in the Fenice but not seen a concert, this one was more than interesting.
Note. The links did not come through in the email but I found them somewhat accidentally on your site, a tad confusing.
Vern
Thank you so much for sharing bits of the concert. The very first time I heard Offenbach’s Barcarolle I had no context for it. I was a college kid, studying art history in Rome, made an excursion to Venice on my own. It was February during the first oil crisis. Not a tourist anywhere (no central heat anywhere, either!). On a silent Ash Wednesday morning I was alone in the Sala del Maggior Consiglio of the Ducal Palace, where the brilliant morning sun shone in and flooded the magnificent ceiling with light reflected from terazzo. In the silence, as I studied the magnificent ceiling, I could hear a little band of musicians perhaps at Cafe Chioggia, playing the Barcarolle to the empty chairs in the piazzetta. I forever associated that tune with Venice. It was decades before I happened to attend a performance of the Tales of Hoffman and discovered the scene is set in Venice. A charming surprise and charming memory stirred by your lovely post. Thank you, and a happy and healthy New Year to you and yours.
I’m so glad you have such wonderful memories and your description made me feel that I was there. Oh wait…. Joking aside, it always makes me happy to hear what amazing experiences people have had here, and how they treasure them.
“Happy New Year” of course, to you. Let’s hope that we will get to Venice again at some time – seems like the longest time we’ve ever been away since first we found Venice. Really missing it, but your wonderful posts give us a small “sniff” of the real thing, just to keep us going until …..