c/o MusicWeb International
Dear Mr Moore, I am a child in artistic matters, incarcerated in a workhouse named the Twenty-First Century, from which I fear I shall never escape. In this workhouse, I am being fed a diet consisting mainly of operatic gruel. Most of the little solid nourishment I get comes from MusicWeb International. Please, sir, I want more!
I believe two sorts of additional food would particularly help to balance my diet.
1. I benefited so much from your recentish surveys of Early Verdi and Donizetti that I wonder whether you might be able to supply similar surveys of other interesting “less well-known” operas—anything of the kind that appealed to your taste. You might, e.g., have some favourite recordings of late 18th century operas (Paisiello? Cimarosa? Gluck? etc.). And the recent forum discussion of Das Christelflein made me wonder what recordings of Pfitzner and/or his near-contemporaries (late 19th/early 20th century) you particularly enjoy (if any!). But I’m not asking for these specifically—just citing them as possible examples. As with the Donizetti survey, I’m not asking for comprehensiveness—just comments on selected personal favourites in whatever areas you like. And I’m certainly not asking for surveys of operas you don’t much like—that would be a thankless chore, and in any case I don’t think anyone writes well on such subjects (as some of the chapters in the Opera on Record series painfully demonstrate!).
2. I also keep coming back to the “Untouchable and Most Recommendable” survey, and hungering for fuller and broader discussion of some of the operas mentioned in it. Yes, some of your readers will indeed want to know what is The Single Best Recording of an opera. But I suspect most of your readers like to collect multiple recordings of favourite operas, to approach each work from different angles. You’ve already provided expanded discussions of one or two of the operas from this survey (e.g., Don Giovanni), and I’d love to consume more delicacies of that sort. Of course, nobody will expect you to survey every recording of (say) La Traviata. But if we already have La Traviata with Callas, and we want to add one or two others (or even a little more than one or two)—what would be some of the other options, and what would be the distinctive attractions of each? Again, I’m not asking for Traviata in particular—just citing it as an example.
In the old days I asked for more gruel. But now I know better. What I really want in my diet is less gruel, and more Moore.
Yours with deepest gratitude and respect,
O. Twist
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