Jonas Kaufmann Documentary
A bit late to be posting on this but I didn't see anything else about it, so thought I'd take the plunge.
The documentary was shown over the Christmas season on BBC4. Like most such documentaries, it was sudsy and soft focus, the intention presumably being to show what a 'regular guy' the singer is, despite his massive international success.
However, anyone viewing it with an objective eye would have found it somewhat troubling, I feel.
Great stress was placed upon Kaufmann's modesty and undiva-ish temperament. Yet it was clear that he wields enormous power in everything he undertakes - overruling a conductor during rehearsals for his (aborted) Barbican performance of Vier Letzte Lieder and putting Keith Warner in his place (maybe no bad thing) at the ROH Otello rehearsals. The fact that Kaufmann's manner wasn't overbearing or outwardly 'arrogant' didn't disguise what was happening.....
In the Concergebouw Wagner concert, I felt that JK was prolonging the 'Walse!' just to prove that he could. Mindless showboating.
Otoh, the scene where a Middlesbrough housewife crept into a rehearsal to snag JK's autograph and steal a few moments with her 'hero' helped me to understand why some artists end up despising their audiences.
Really: there wasn't much difference between this programme and a profile of any common or garden 'pop' singer of the moment (whcih is what JK is in danger of becoming, on this evidence).
A bit late to be posting on this but I didn't see anything else about it, so thought I'd take the plunge.
The documentary was shown over the Christmas season on BBC4. Like most such documentaries, it was sudsy and soft focus, the intention presumably being to show what a 'regular guy' the singer is, despite his massive international success.
However, anyone viewing it with an objective eye would have found it somewhat troubling, I feel.
Great stress was placed upon Kaufmann's modesty and undiva-ish temperament. Yet it was clear that he wields enormous power in everything he undertakes - overruling a conductor during rehearsals for his (aborted) Barbican performance of Vier Letzte Lieder and putting Keith Warner in his place (maybe no bad thing) at the ROH Otello rehearsals. The fact that Kaufmann's manner wasn't overbearing or outwardly 'arrogant' didn't disguise what was happening.....
In the Concergebouw Wagner concert, I felt that JK was prolonging the 'Walse!' just to prove that he could. Mindless showboating.
Otoh, the scene where a Middlesbrough housewife crept into a rehearsal to snag JK's autograph and steal a few moments with her 'hero' helped me to understand why some artists end up despising their audiences.
Really: there wasn't much difference between this programme and a profile of any common or garden 'pop' singer of the moment (whcih is what JK is in danger of becoming, on this evidence).
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