Jussi, Ken, Turandot and me

I'm not doing much at the moment. Preparing lessons or drinking whisky whilst smoking and reading in the nearest bar doesn't provide much raw material for blog posts. I've become a bit of a Billy No Mates. I still go to the pictures but even that is becoming faintly depressing. I saw three films this weekend. All of them were dubbed into Spanish and the only one I understood in its entirety was Philomena. I suspect that I understood it because it has a British sensibility - like me.

My classical music tastes are a bit plebeian too - very Classic FM. That's probably why my favourite bit of opera is the aria Nessun Dorma from Turandot. That's the tune that Pavarotti took it to number two in the BBC top forty back in 1990 when it was used as the World Cup theme song. I like the Jussi Bjórling version best but my reason for that is also a bit prosaic. I first heard it as Ken Russell's contribution to the 1987 film Aria. Not exactly a Glyndebourne experience. Anyway the promise of Nessun Dorma live was enough to persuade me to get down to El Batel alone when I saw that Turandot was on.

El Batel is a conference centre and music auditorium in Cartagena. It's an interesting building designed by the Madrid based architects José Selgas and Lucia Cano. The building is clad internally and externally in coloured polycarbonate which glows with light. It's a very rectangular building, all straight lines with orange as a key colour. As I said I like it but there are plenty of people who don't. One of the reasons Cartageneros don't care for it is that it cost a little more than originally planned - sixty million instead of the budgeted twenty million. Maggie and I were amongst it's first paying guests for a Pat Metheny concert back in November 2011 on the night of the last Spanish General Election and we've been back several times. I noticed as I went in tonight that the floor surface isn't holding up too well, lots of air blisters.

I had a great seat, front row of the dress circle and when the curtain was pulled back there were plenty of people on stage and quite an elaborate set. It looked like it was going to be a decent production. I wasn't impressed by the singing though. Now my critical understanding of opera is pretty limited. I've seen a fair few over the years starting with Janacek's Katya Kabanova back in 1982 but I've never got to grips with what it is that I'm seeing and hearing. I thought tonight's stuff lacked power but looking for reviews of the Ukranian Donbass Opera production on the Internet I couldn't find any so I'm probably wrong. After all I'm the only person in the world who disliked (intensely) Twelve Years a Slave.

And as for Nessun Dorma, well it was there but when the chap stopped to take a bow after he'd sung it I thought that was overstepping the popular culture mark. True I hadn't shaved and I was wearing jeans but aren't there limits to how frivolous these things should be?