| *sporfle* |
[May. 7th, 2008|09:19 pm] |
Apparently on a talent show on ZDF this spring, they had a musicals theme and Uwe Kröger as a judge. This makes for entertaining clips of him making faces as people torture German and English musicals.
But this is something else. They had Villazon as a guest star, because apart from being Caruso Jr, he's also done Man of La Mancha. Which he did admirably - guy's got a siege weapon of a voice on him.
And then he and the host went and did Always look on the bright side of life. Yes, from Spamalot. Monty Python. My brain!
(Video under cut, because I refuse to be the only one traumatised.)
( Bad and wrong and yay ) |
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| Sometimes, a voice makes you flail |
[Apr. 25th, 2008|09:17 pm] |
I'm watching the Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert (more on which, and the book, later), and after Act 1 I made the mistake of looking up Michael Maguire on Youtube.
His voice in Music of the Night has left me spellbound
There's something about his emotion... oh gods, why doesn't this man act more? |
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| I need more Phantom icons |
[Apr. 15th, 2008|07:41 pm] |
Apparently there was a promotional event for the Warsaw Phantom of the Opera recently. This would be the lovely Raoul, with the third Christine (the one I saw the second time).
( All I ask of you ) |
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| Black Ships: review proper |
[Mar. 19th, 2008|03:59 pm] |
I've finished reading Black Ships by ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) jo_graham for the third time. I've a feeling it won't be the last.
( Thoughts and analysis )
Incidentally, I'm currently working on a story set in Greek mythology for ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) lgbtfest. Re-reading Black Ships, I was reminded of two major issues about that pantheon - how powerful and mysterious was the female, and how dreary, thought-losing, the afterlife. Endless fields of grain under an eternal sun. I hope no-one will mind if I swipe that sentence. |
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| Recommended reading |
[Dec. 30th, 2007|02:17 pm] |
At the seaside, I was purposefully out of my usual reading material, and thus raiding the grandparents' collection of Important Works of Literature. Isaac Singer's The Estate is a very nice insight into Belle Epoque Jews if only one can look past the characters, which are the whiniest bunch I've seen since Neon Genesis Evangelion. The Godfather would be a perfect read if at least three characters in my head weren't ogling Michael Corleone with illicit purposes. Mann's Buddenbrooks faltered a bit in the middle, but the teenage slash at the end redeemed them (okay, the other bits were interesting, too). Doctor Zhivago caused me to facepalm over my Russian ancestry.
All in all, it was a relief to come back to an open yuletide archive.
This year I've been damnably lucky with my gifts - I received two full-length stories and a vignette. No idea yet who they're from, but all are gorgeous:
Ourobos - Tanz der Vampire behind the scenes; a different interpretation than my own, but I can imagine Thomas Borchert and Jakub Wocial in these roles far too easily.
Conversations with the Dead - Elisabeth, the deaths of Sophie, Rudolf and Franz-Joseph: the amount of historical detail is delightful.
And Black And Black And Blacker Still - Elisabeth, a heartbreaking Rudolf moment that reaches to the core of his character.
And from other stories that I've skimmed, four so far had me glued to the screen and exclaiming with delight:
The Invisible City - a sequel to Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere that should damn well be official. It's like turning a page and finding a lost epilogue to the story. This could be Neil writing.
By No Miracle or Majestic Means - for all that I avoid Vorkosigan fanfiction like the plague, this story of a young Miles's caper is perfectly in tune. It suffers a little from rush - I know well the lack of time to balance the plot at the end - but the language is Ivan's, the characters are vividly themselves.
The Sixth Heaven - the Beauty and the Beast TV series has always remained with me, and this AU with Catherine and Vincent meeting as children captures the magic perfectly.
The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down - You've probably seen this Who Framed Roger Rabbit story recced by others. All I'm saying is, hold on to your hats. |
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| Website design as a statement |
[Oct. 4th, 2007|11:08 am] |
There are ways to do simple sites and minimalist ones.
Maison Martin Margiela does it in style. And the clothes and sunglasses are way cool. |
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| On the musicals front |
[Jul. 26th, 2007|02:08 pm] |
The guy in my icon is the newest - first cast - Abronsius in Berlin. At age 21, without being a German or Austrian, and that's for a role that demands tongue-twisters at breakneck speed O.o
Also, I've spent quite a bit of time happily staring at photos from the new Budapest production of Elisabeth. I am quite frightened by the lengths some people are willing to go to to make this guy look like this guy.
Combined, I would say it means I can look forward to repeat trips to both Berlin and Budapest. Curses :P |
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| It's opera in primetime, of course I'm aware |
[Jun. 15th, 2007|07:02 am] |
Just in case anyone's managed to miss it so far: Britain's Got Talent (Brits might recognise Simon Cowell in the jury), mobile phone salesman, opera.
See Simon Cowell jawdrop to Nessun Dorma:
And the git got better in the semi-finals:
I mean, honestly. The guy's got vibrato, he's got a lovely scale, and that depth there - so many tenors have voices that have been squashed flat. He's good, and since he hit even Polish papers, he's going places :) |
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| More in the piratey line of thought |
[May. 28th, 2007|09:23 am] |
roz_mcclure is apparently my LJ-friend two times removed or something via fyrie and ashfae, but what matters is that her POTC:AWE recap rocks to high heavens:
part 1
part 2
*drums fingers waiting for part 3* |
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| Shiny things |
[May. 19th, 2007|02:48 pm] |
In case you were wondering, the first two episodes of Heroes made me laugh lots. Since they're showing 2 per week, I should be caught up with the rest of you soon.
rkold is an absolute angel. I am looking forward to boggling my workmates with Original Takarazuka Goodies. "Who is that?" "A Heian-era prince who's sleeping with the mother of his reincarnated father. As played by a girl :D"
But the point of this post: Miss Snark has announced her retirement from her blog.
I must say hers is the best blog I've read for authors looking to be published. She gives a great insight on the industry, the agents, everything. After reading her for the past year I now know much more about how to go about being published. If anyone else is serious about seeing their names on covers of Actual Paper Books, I have to recommend this blog. And now, since there's no telling how long it'll stay up... |
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| Eurovision yay |
[May. 13th, 2007|07:15 am] |
Eurovision wasn't nearly as fun as last year's (the first time I actually voted \m/), but it was entertaining - sometimes in the fun way, sometimes with actual fun.
( thank gods for Youtube )
Of course, Serbia won. So? Still was fun to watch all the ways people tried to top Lordi \m/ |
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| This looks interesting... |
[May. 12th, 2007|07:39 pm] |
For personal reference: card and box templates. Also here. And Japanese-style projects.
(And if you're interested, I have jeans now. KappAhl of all places. Less than half the price of the River Island ones, plain dark blue, straight leg, everything I wanted. Yay.) |
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| Elisabeth: Maki Ichiro, as found on random Youtube trolling |
[May. 11th, 2007|07:44 am] |
*blinks* I was thinking of ripping a certain clip from a DVD I just got, and look, it's already on Youtube. Maki Ichiro playing Death - as a girl. She's even singing in a more female voice, which is a sight.
( DIVA 2001, Death as a girl and Rudolf as a boy )
This is something else I need to save, Maki's last TCA performance, also an Elisabeth song...
( It's hard to make pale green sequins look good )
And since I'm on a Maki kick, look: Uwe can sing well providing he has the right Elisabeth:
( Bilingual Wenn Ich Tanzen Will, DIVA 2004 )
And now, off to work, so downloading those will have to wait *eyedart* |
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| 2007 international Moniuszko vocal competition (VI edition) |
[Apr. 28th, 2007|07:55 am] |
I was waiting for Polish TV to get off their collective behinds and put up the final concert online before I would post about this, but it looks like they decided the competition's over and so are their obligations. Still.
I spent most of the week before last listening to opera. The VI International Moniuszko Vocal Competition was ongoing, and Polish TV was kind enough to transmit all auditions online. By the time the third and final stage rolled around, I had firm favourites and ended up attending the last day of auditions - I have to say I am very impressed with young operatic talent these days.
People to keep an eye on:
Mika Nisula (Finnish tenor): lovely dramatic and sweet voice who would have gotten Third Male if not for nerves. He managed to bollix up an easy Faust aria completely, being off-key on the one long high note and everything. He then closed his eyes, decided to hell with it and launched into a much, much more difficult aria from Moniuszko's Haunted Manor in a way that made me cry, in a good way. I hate that song - emo-est piece of emo "wah, my mummy's dead!" crap ever - and he was perfect in it, emotional and dignified and everything. Finnish people should take note, he does a lot of work in Helsinki :)
Anna Markarova (Russian mezzo): great voice of the bring-the-house-down kind, but most of all stage charisma and dignity. She doesn't look it, but I could see her doing Empress Catherine or someone - when she's on stage, she's blinding.
Azamat Zheltyrguzov (Kazakh baritone): The guy's 20 and and if he ever switches to musicals, he'll be another Yamaguchi. That kind of velvet voice and stage presence. He didn't make it past 2nd stage, but he knocked enough people flat that the Cracow opera club funded a special, unplanned prize and gave it to him :D
Kristina Kapustynska (Ukrainian mezzo): I was very much reminded of a female version of my favourite Polish guy ;) Same looks, gestures, stage presence and girl version of his voice, from the deepest caverns to a very credible upper range. A year or two and I think Kristina'll be able to sing everything from tenor to soprano. Her voice reminded me very much of the best Takarazuka otokoyaku, and judging by her final concert dress, she'd be a Zuka fangirl in a flash ;) Second Female, and very deservedly so.
Malgorzata Olejniczak (Polish soprano): Third Female and very lovely lady, with a haunting stage presence and energy. For the longest time I didn't know who could be a Polish Elisabeth, but now my dream cast is complete :)
Alexey Markov (Russian baritone): First Male, and missed the Grand Prix by a hair. Knocks you flat, especially at the final concert - the TV studio people criticised his projection the day before, and he did his best to blow out the sound equipment. Musicals-wise, I was reminded of Borchert's stage presence, but the voice... oh, so dreamy :)
And just so I'm not talking about random abstracts, here's Polish TV mutilating the looks of the contestants (trust me, it's the lighting - they're all 100% prettier live :P)
April 20th - click on the picture and go to 5:30 for Olejniczak, 24:00 for Kapustynska
April 21st - click on the picture and go to 21:19 for Markov |
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| Youtube just shorted out my brain |
[Dec. 28th, 2006|11:20 pm] |
I booked my Vienna trip this February (to the 10th anniversary concert of a Certain Musical) early, before the cast was announced. In the interval before we got the cast, I often joked with Mother that with my luck, Von Krolock would end up being Uwe Kröger (something of my personal German musical nemesis, aka the guy I love to hate).
The VK at the concert will fortunately be Thomas Borchert, whom I adore for his voice, presence and mesmerising eyes, but um. I think I jinxed it.
Uwe Kröger and Maya Hakvoort doing Totale Finsternis. Which would work better if she wasn't half a head taller than him.
As an antidote (though remaining with German musicals), have some Borchert singing a song from Mozart!. My perennial favourite Máté Kamarás does a wonderful job with another one.
(And in other musical news, my OTHER favourite, Maki Ichiro - see icon - gave birth in October to a baby girl. Mother: played Death and Elisabeth. Father: played Death. I think this is one kid who's going to be raised on Kunze/Levay lullabies :>) |
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| Am back |
[Dec. 28th, 2006|10:44 am] |
I got back last night but ended up in a passive state of blah regarding online things ;) Mostly caught up on the f-list, have downloads queued up to take me a long while, and the whole of yuletide to read.
In the meantime, some recs:
Some Sort of Poetry - my first Christmas present, drunken student smut with what might just as well be original characters. fyrie rocks beyond belief.
Personal Demons - this would be what I got on the second day of Christmas. fyrie again, Jekyll/Hyde bdsm non-con semi-wank, and if that description doesn't make you check it out...
Sympathy of Wolves - my Yuletide gift, which rocks to high heavens. Dracula!!! |
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| Johnny Cash for the win |
[Nov. 10th, 2006|02:06 pm] |
New video of a Johnny Cash song
I'm weak for the Man in Black, and on this posthumous release a busload of celebrities pay homage to his style. Watch out for Johnny Depp, Kate Moss, Amy Lee and others. |
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| Belated Halloween post |
[Nov. 1st, 2006|11:03 am] |
Just in case anyone's wondering, I've been stuck at home and mostly resting. This convalescent thing blows.
Halloween's not celebrated here except for some parties, which I missed due to swooning and other neat special effects courtesy of my own body. Except for the awesomely neat moon last night, with the clouds chasing each other over it. I thought that only happened in movies.
Here are three neat scary things I found last night, though:
Vincent - Tim Burton's first stop-motion short film, narrated by Vincent Price
VG Cats Halloween - geeky goodness and language mastery
Neil Gaiman's article in New York Times - I do adore him so |
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| Musical dorks |
[Oct. 6th, 2006|04:10 pm] |
It has been pointed out to me that a lot of my favourite musical people are dorks. Therefore I thought I'd assemble some video proof of the fact ;) Under the cut: musicals might rot the brain.
( Lukasz, Jakub, Mate, Maki, Steve )
And as a bonus, because a clip of the Yukigumi Elisabeth only appeared on Youtube recently, this would be my original androgynous Death, AKA Azrael Thanatos, as played by Maki Ichiro:
( Thanatos in all hir glory ) |
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| DVD commentary meme |
[Aug. 27th, 2006|07:37 pm] |
Had coffee with maggiehoneybite, who's alive and well. trixie_chick wrote me a lovely Yami no Matsuei drabble :). And look, this meme's going around again. Anyone?
If you've ever watched your favorite DVDs, and then found yourself eager to hear exactly what the actors, directors, writers and even production designers thought about making the episode, the movie, or whatever - you'll know sometimes the best parts of DVDs are hearing the commentaries. Getting into an actor's feelings about the character they play, getting the background behind a writer's plans and metaphors, even just getting the stupid anecdotal stuff that makes you laugh, it's all good.
Ask me about any story, and I'll do a DVD commentary for it! Satisfy your curiosity!
(List of fics here and earlier stuff at the site.) |
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| Slash heaven |
[Aug. 25th, 2006|01:29 pm] |
If you have any artistic appreciation for the male body whatsoever, go check out Dieux du Stade. The subjects are members of the French rugby team. I've been staring wide-eyed for several minutes now. I didn't think the lines of a man's back could be so mesmerising.
*melts*
(Also, big thanks to the shoe fairy. The shoemaker found the boots I left there in April 2005, my favourite pair ever, which has seen me throughout college :D) |
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| Youtube goodness |
[Aug. 21st, 2006|09:58 am] |
Almost caught up on backlog - I still have a mile-long list of fics and longer posts. Alas, my computer is still being a ditz; I think it's the cooling fan, but it means that I can't do anything too processor-intensive. Writing and icons may have to wait a bit :/
In the meantime, here are two things that I've had in hardcopy for a while, but wanted to share on LJ and couldn't find online:
Clips from Yukigumi's 1996 Elisabeth
Maki Ichiro (Death, white-haired dudette) is LOVE. And as soon as I can edit them, I'll have way too many icons of her. Alas, this montage focuses on Rudolf, but there are glimpses.
Jakub Wocial singing Gethsemane
Stupid boy made me cry the first time I heard him sing that. Kind souls have put many clips from his recent recital online, and any Phantom fans are recommended to watch the Phantom ones, but Gethsemane... gah, that voice. That voice. Guy's freaking 20, too. I was technically aware there are people with voices like that, but I didn't expect to meet one face-to-face. You'd never tell it by his out-of-character speaking voice, either. |
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| On creativity and referentialism |
[Aug. 5th, 2006|06:29 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | art, linkage, writing meta | ] |
| [ | Mood |
| |  pensive | ] |
| [ | Music |
| | Elisabeth - Ai to Shi no Rondo (Yuichiro Yamaguchi) | ] |
Still no writing done. And I switched to colour pencils, which have the advantage of not leaving my thighs covered with abstract artwork. I know I should go wash my hands each time I run out of smudging fingers when I work with pastels, but wiping them on my skin is quicker. (And no, I have no ambitions to create Art with my doodling; I just want to be able to produce workmanlike drawings that resemble the subject, because sometimes something just begs for illustration.)
I have, though, been reading the writeup of the Cassandra Claire Plagiarism Debacle. I have to say the writing's better - or maybe the subject less convoluted - than the msscribe saga. I must say that back-when I had the same problems while reading the Draco trilogy, and finally I gave up mid-Dormiens.
It's also made me somewhat paranoid about my own pretentious postmodern parlour tricks: how far can I go with referencing others? The sky over the bay was the color of a television tuned into a dead channel. Verbatim, unreferenced because I assume those who know, do, and those who don't, won't care, is this homage or plagiarism?
(And it doesn't help that I have a digital memory for quotes. There is a man, playing a violin, and the strings are the nerves in his own arm. If I love, I quote, verbatim and at length.) |
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| Link dump |
[Jul. 28th, 2006|10:09 pm] |
Ganked from shoiryu, mostly for my own perusal, but might be interesting to other language-curious people and writers...
( Mostly linguistics ) |
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| Friday Fic Recs |
[Jul. 28th, 2006|02:27 pm] |
First of all, fyrie's Dance of Death: Obligatto, PWP with breathplay, utterly enjoyable even if you don't know the characters :> And do read to compare with my upcoming PWP with breathplay, which was written because fyrie and Herbert are evil to the extreme.
It's been a while since I recced anything by guede_mazaka, because she's been writing Supernatural lately and I've the vaguest idea about it. But now she's back in POTC fandom with a vengeance, and she's the only person who can make me believe in Sparrington and want more, too. In Judas Kiss she does it beautifully. And Blooded is Will/Norrington as Norrington searches for an anchor and Will's unable to change, stark and violent and confused just like the inside of Norrington's head.
Finally, shezan wrote me a neat little vignette on Vader and imperial bureaucracy, with Piett, my favourite Imperial :D |
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| When fandoms collide |
[Jul. 26th, 2006|02:53 pm] |
Jim Steinman is doing a Batman musical :D At least he's the right person for it musically - that's exactly the vibe a Batman musical should take, operatic and heroic rock with just the right amount of camp. Here's hoping they get good people for it.
And in his blog, he mentions plans for a film of Tanz that's "up to Polanski". OMGgahgibbleYAY. I do have Tanz on DVD (original Vienna cast), but a true movie, with effects and everything, and hmm, didn't Polanski say that Malwina was his perfect Sarah and rave all over Lukasz's voice? :>
(On the employment front, I got the contract today :D And I'm justified in complaining about the heat: it's the hottest July in recorded history. But I think I'm getting used to the temperatures now.) |
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| Heat, Vox and evil people |
[Jul. 24th, 2006|05:45 pm] |
The heat is disturbing my laptop's operation again. After some normal operation, the high-speed fan kicks in and the processor seems to enter some kind of overheat-protection mode that slows everything down something awful. As a result, I'm unable to watch videos or do graphics, which is a pain.
Especially since fyrie wandered off to Sweden and left me alone. (If wolfmoonie happens to read this, all the best on your wedding day :)) Which is a good point as any for me to pimp her recent work so that you people can leave feedback for her once she returns. I think that for once I'm caught up with pimping her Carpe Noctem series, because we got sidetracked there. She wrote an angsty prequel though: Und Alle Engel Müssen Fall'n. Then she temporarily ditched that continuity to write a lovely Herbert-turning fic and Herbert in a modern Goth club (a rather masterful work of bunnying on my part). And then we both got the Elisabeth bug, which on her part turned into a crossover series called Dance of Death (with vampires in it, Prelude, Nocturne and Elegy) - the latter has high slash content of the very attractive kind ;) And an Elisabeth genfic about Sophie's death: On Silent Wings.
And while I'm fyrie-less and bored, I also have more Vox invites than I can shake a stick at. I already gave out 6, have 2 in my account at this point, and each time I get rid of them, a few hours later I have more. So if anyone should want a Vox account like mine, drop me a line and I'll send you an invite as soon as I have it. |
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