"Humour sharpens the sense of all that is human," says Peter Klier, a retired headmaster who turned his hobbies - opera and painting - into his livelihood a few years ago. He's since published several books of operatically-themed illustrations.
His recent Wagner-laweia repositions Richard Wagner's greatest operas in a seaside postcard world of bewbs and botties, dotted with the sort of details that only a true Wagnerite could conjure up. Here are a few samples:
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The star of dozens of Royal Opera performances is the subject of a new biography
Pollyanne the opera donkey made her debut in Pagliacci. Now a mainstay of Carmen, she has upstaged singers from Angela Gheorghiu to Placido Domingo.
Read an adapted extract here.
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Aren't books so much better when they're not stuffed with words? Any opera lover with beefy biceps and a short attention span should be thrilled to find Helena Matheopoulos’s hefty Fashion Designers at the Opera
The veteran music writer - one of the few journalists ever to interview Carlos Kleiber - profiles ten fashion designers who've turned their hand to opera. All are interviewed, but of course it's the many sketches and photographs which make the book come to life.
Designers covered are - Giorgio Armani • Marc Bohan • Christian Lacroix • Karl Lagerfeld • Ottavio and Rosita Missoni • Miuccia Prada • Zandra Rhodes Emanuel Ungaro • GianniVersace •Viktor & Rolf
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Good news. Last year's most amazing opera cook book, like, evah - Die Oper Kocht - has been translated from German.
The English version is called The Opera Cooks and is officially launched on 2 August (though you can already buy it in Salzburg at the Festspielhaus shop). I will publish ordering details once I find them out.
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Another one from the home of Sir Colin Davis's kebab recipe, Adrian Ball's 1971 Food of Love: The Favourite Feasts of World's Music-Makers.
The recipes contributed by the long list of musicians vary so much in style and detail that I can only think they were included pretty much as written, with minimal editing.
Claudio Arrau, at the time possibly the greatest living pianist, offers an extravagantly concocted Lobster Bisque.
At the other end of the scale, a joint contribution from Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears combines the unforgotten proscriptions of rationing with the Englishman's enduring fondness for nursery food. In other words, how English food earned its bad name.
Here is their starter, Miss Hudson's Soup:
"Take the bone of a good English sirloin (or any bones or chicken carcase) a great deal of onions, celery and carrots, varying in emphasis according to preference of taste. (We like a lot of carrots.) Cover with water in a deep pot, and simmer for three hours. Cool, remove fat, strain and season."
They follow with Soles Red House (fried breaded soles) and Dark Treacle Jelly, and accompany with "the Wine Society's Chablis".
Like many of the book's contributors, when asked to suggest music for the meal, they responded "none of course".
All the better to savour those carrots.
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Have we forgotten how to enjoy music?
A letter from W.A.Mozart in Paris to his father on July 3, 1778 about of the premiere of his Symphony Number 31 in D major, aka the 'Paris':
"In the midst of the first allegro came a passage I had known would please. The audience was quite carried away - there was a great outburst of applause."
"The andante also found favour, but particularly the last allegro because, having noticed that all last allegri here opened, like the first, with all instruments together and usually in unison, began with two violins only, piano for eight bars only, then forte, so that at the piano (as I had expected) the audience said "Sh!" and when they heard the forte began at once to clap their hands."
and again on 9 July 1778:
"the symphony was hightly approved of - and Le Gros [the concert director] is so pleased with it that he says it is his very best symphony. But the Andante has not had the good fortune to win his approval; he declares that it has too many modulations and that it is too long. He derives this opinion, however, from the fact that the audience forgot to clap their hands as loudly and to shout as much as they did at the end of the first and last movements"
(from The Letters of Mozart and His Family, translated by Emily Anderson)
Never mind Historically Informed Performance, what about Historically Informed audience response?
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Prom 62: Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester / Sir Colin Davis / Nikolaj Znaider - Royal Albert Hall, 1 September 2008
Celebrity cook books tend to be denigrated, even dismissed out of hand, often by people you'd expect to have more inquiring minds. But they can offer unique insights - social, cultural, even psychological. Especially when it comes to musicians, constantly probed about their work, rarely asked about themselves.
The recipe Sir Colin Davis contributed to a 1971 compilation by Adrian Ball, Food of Love: The Favourite Feasts of World's Music-Makers, demonstrates that there's more to rice than throwing the lid on the pan and letting it boil until half of it turns to mush and the other half sticks to the bottom. In the lengthy preparation, the meticulously detailed instructions, the surprise finishing touch, Sir Colin reveals everything he brought to last night's magnificent performance of Sibelius 2, which can be watched here for the next week.
I give you - Sir Colin's kebab:
Chelo Kebab - Rice with Kebab
Kebab Marinade for 2 hours or more 2 pounds of lamb cut from the leg or 2 pounds of fillet steak (cut into suitable pieces for skewering) in 4 tablespoons of cooking Sherry, 2 tablespoons of olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper, 1 small onion and 2 cloves of garlic, finely grated.
Skewer the meat and grill fiercely both sides for 5 minutes. Sprinkle with salt before serving.
Rice 1 pound of rice washed and soaked in generously salted warm water for 2 hours or more. Bring to the boil 3 pints of water. Strain the water from the rice and put soaked rice into boiling water. Bring back to boil and cook for 2 minutes. Strain rice through colander. Put 1 cup of water into an empty saucepan with 6oz of butter and bring to the boil. Return three-quarters of this to the cup.
Place the strained rice carefully into the saucepan. Replace lid and leave it on a low gas for 5 minutes. Pour the liquid in the cup carefully over the rice, wrap lid in a small towel, and press it firmly home. Reduce gas to a minimum and brew for half an hour.
Serve the rice with a raw yolk of egg hidden in the hot rice for each person. A green salad of lettuce, green peppers and cucumber does no harm.
Serve with a light burgundy. And the music to play? Absolutely none according to Sir Colin. And quite right, too.
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