The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the Metropolitan Opera, and New York City Opera’s tribute to Beverly Sills has just ended. What a heartwarming presentation it was! The event was free. Tickets were given away starting at noon today on a first-come, first-served basis at the Met box-office. The event was also broadcast live to Times Square and on Sirius Satellite Radio (my venue). The performers included, Plá¡cido Domingo (accompanied by James Levine on piano), who sang Handel’s “Ombra mai fù”; Anna Netrebko singing Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Nightingale and the Rose”; John Relyea singing Schubert’s “An die Musik”; and Natalie Dessay who sang Strauss’ “IIch wollt ein Sträußlein binden”. The speakers included many of Sills’ family and friends: her brother, Stanley Sills told a story about the famous “pubic” typo in the first edition of Sills’ autobiography, Bubbles; Mayor Mike Bloomberg spoke of Sills’ penchant for fundraising; Met Chairman, Peter Gelb said her departure from the Met had nothing to do with his arrival (which Sills orchestrated); comedian Carol Burnett was especially touching as she relayed that Sills’ was the first person she phoned whenever she came to New York; television journalist, Barbara Walters spoke heartwarmingly about Sills’ daughter “Muffy” who is deaf and suffers from MS; and former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger described the “hide-in-plane-sight” affair the two shared (tongue-in-cheek, of course).
The two-hour event was interspersed with recorded performances by Beverly Sills, including the song, “Just an Octave Apart,” a duo she sang with Carol Burnett.
All of the speakers were sincere and witty; obviously, Beverly Sills had touched each of them in a very special way. Peter Gelb, whom Sills hired, said she would call him after he’d started working and ask, “Peter, is everything perfect?” Today, Gelb’s reply was, “Sadly, Beverly, without you the world of opera is less perfect.”
Peter Gelb, General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera, was voted into TIME’s 100 for 2008! Gelb became the Met’s 16th general manager in 2006, and he immediately launched a crusade to reinvigorate the sometimes stodgy world of opera. His initiatives, most notably the high-definition live broadcasts in movie theaters across the country, and in Europe and Japan has brought opera to a wider audience. Additionally, last September Sirius Satellite Radio started broadcasting Met opera performances 24/7! Anna Netrebko, the stunning Russian soprano, has written the tribute to Peter Gelb in TIME. In the article Netrebko refers to Gelb as “revolutionary and a visionary in the field of classical music” and says what impresses her most is that he has “implemented these new and exciting programs while also elevating the art of great singing.”
Recent Comments