The concert week continues; I sing the chorus part in Don Giovanni in a few hours. The chorus part consisting of approximately 30 measures of music, this will be mostly an excuse for me to watch the action from up close. And the cast being amazing, the action should be excellent indeed.
I was actually reading this New Yorker article about the complete Mozart oeuvre during one of the long stretches between our entrances during one rehearsal this week, but had to stop—there was just too much to watch. For instance, the celebrated scene in which Leporello explains to the stunned Elvira that she is just one of his master’s conquests, then proceeds to read the list from a log that he has kept. In the first runthrough, Leporello used his own paperbound copy of the score as the “catalogue.” In the second, there was a burst of laughter and applause as at the requisite moment in the aria, Levine’s own hard-bound score appeared, passed to Leporello via one of the wind players. Leporello took the score, gaily referred to it during the aria, then passed it back, Levine conducting from memory all the while. The humor of using the score as the catalog, as Leporello’s record of Don Giovanni’s conquests, is delicious, and plays nicely on the metaphysical level.