Alphabet associations - I

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Well, after my last puzzle lasted for eleven months, this one took less than an hour

Neruda

Samuel Barber: The Lovers, for baritone, chorus & orchestra, Op. 43

Peter Leiberson: Neruda Songs, for mezzo-soprano soloist and orchestra (written for his wife Lorraine Hunt Lieberson)

(there's also a later set of Neruda settings by Lieberson: Songs of Love and Sorrow)

Il Postino - the 90s film with Neruda as one of the main characters (not sure about the 'Sunday' bit)

Ah! Not quite the answer on the card - purely Musical, and the "quiet Sunday" is significant (especially bearing in mind the language Neruda wrote in).

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Does Johann Baptist Georg Neruda feature in ferney's conundrum? (Not that I can associate him)

Sadly not - although, if I'd known about him, he would certainly have featured!

[Flay]

Here it is:

Mexican composer Daniel Catán wrote an opera Il Postino (2010), whose premiere production featured Spanish tenor Plácido Domingo portraying Pablo Neruda.

His last opera, Il Postino, whose premiere featured Plácido Domingo in the role of Pablo Neruda, is based on the 1983 novel Ardiente paciencia by Antonio Skármeta and the 1994 film Il Postino by Michael Radford; it premiered at the Los Angeles Opera in September 2010.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Here it is:

- and Flay gets the rebound!

Nonetheless, after an impression hat-trick, Cali gets the Onus of the next puzzle.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

No - I said "Onus"!

[Nick Armstrong]

No - I said "Onus"!

I will attempt it with rectitude.

And so bringing up the rear is "Plácido Domingo = Peaceful Sunday" ! Why had that never struck me as the translation before !?

Nice one ferns.

Ah yes... the next question...



O, what a journey: from a thousand trades to the northern Serenissima then the big smoke…

[cloughie]

No - I said "Onus"!

Could be his Magnum Onus!

[Nick Armstrong]

Could be his Magnum Onus!

I just beat you with my Magnificent Octopus

[Lat-Literal]

I will attempt it with rectitude.

And so bringing up the rear is "Plácido Domingo = Peaceful Sunday" ! Why had that never struck me as the translation before !?

Nice one ferns.

Ah yes... the next question...



O, what a journey: from a thousand trades to the northern Serenissima then the big smoke…

Northern Serinissima - Bruges (Venice of the North)?

The Big Smoke - Manchester?

[vinteuil]

Birmingham saw itself as the city as the thousand trades - but it also saw itself as the northern Venice (I know, I know ) - all them canals.

But I don't think the Sage of Nottingham means someone going from Birmingham to Birmingham.

A conductor, am I thinking?

[Lat-Literal]

Birmingham - perhaps Stockholm rather than Bruges - London/Salford/Manchester (BBC).

Is this Sakari Oramo?

[vinteuil]

- Bruges (Venice of the North)?

... the plump self-confidence with which so many towns saw themselves as a northern Venice -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venice_of_the_North

Venice I am sure regularly calls itself the Birmingham - or the Wrocław - of the south...

[cloughie]

I just beat you with my Magnificent Octopus

Watch out for the tentacles!

[cloughie]

Birmingham - perhaps Stockholm rather than Bruges - London/Salford/Manchester (BBC).

Is this Sakari Oramo?

Could well be Lat!

[cloughie]

... the plump self-confidence with which so many towns saw themselves as a northern Venice -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venice_of_the_North

Venice I am sure regularly calls itself the Birmingham - or the Wrocław - of the south...

Should do B'ham has more miles of canal!