Jennifer Rowley bounces back

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Jennifer Rowley, the American soprano clumsily dumped from the Royal Opera House's Robert le Diable in 2012, has revealed more about the fiasco to the Wall Street Journal.

After agreeing to sub at a late stage for the pregnant Diana Damrau, she ran into problems in rehearsals. Conductor Daniel Oren "wanted it to go really fast and really high," she told the WSJ. "It was like trying to get an F150 to move like a Fiat."

"When you are trying to sing, and you are stressed and worried and crying, it immediately goes to the throat," she said. "Everything becomes constricted and tight."

"I thought this was the end of my career."

Fortunately for her, the Met disagreed. Last night she triumphed there as Musetta in La bohème.  The New York Classical Review was first off the reviewing block, praising her "memorable house debut" and her "rich, dark, but nimble voice."

Bridges have not been burned with the ROH either. True to their 2012 promise, they've hired her to sing Musetta in 2015 - when a certain will-she, won't-she Russian soprano may or may not turn up to give us her Mimì as well.

Comments

[Siggy]

Glad to see Miss Rowley having a success and look forward to her belated debut at ROH. As for Trebs as Mimi, I suspect that will go the way of Margeurite. But never mind, perhaps Angie can jump in - I hear she knows the part.

[SJT]

That won't stop her having a memory lapse mid-way through "Mi chiamano Mimi"....

[laura]

Is AN going to sing Mimi next season? And here I was hoping that she'd bring one of her exciting new Verdi roles to London....

[inter mezzo]

Until she let the ROH down by pulling out of Faust, my understanding is that she wasn't going to sing here at all next year. Given that next season and her calendar were 99% set in stone before that happened, my guess is it's the only place they could fit her in. (And it's still not happening for certain, btw).

[Renata P.]

If they schedule AN for Mimi, I wonder what will they schedule AG for? It can't be La Rondine or La Boheme, so what's left? Tosca or Adriana or something new?

[gogo13@gmx.at]

I hope AG will come up with sth. new but as far as I know, nothing new is planned so it could be Adriana (or Tosca) again. She mentioned Norma in future and Manon Lescaut but she won´t do any of those until she is offered a new production.
Maybe we will see her as Violetta again. Not sure if she will attempt this role ever again?!

[KM]

Adriana is due another outing I believe.

[SJT]

"She mentioned Norma in future and Manon Lescaut but she won´t do any of those until she is offered a new production."

Or develops a voice capable of singing them, with or without a prompter. She'll sing Siegfried sooner than Norma...

[Vecchio John]

I hope that does not mean they are dumping soemthing else for another "interminable" Boheme run, as they did with the infamous Traviata runs replacing Oberon and The Village Romeo and Juliet.
Isn't the ROH season announcement due any day now?

[Jon]

Somewhat off-topic, for which I apologise, but the BBC have confirmed that, alongside Rolando Villazon's documentary on Don Giovanni in Prague, BBC4 will be showing Kaspar Holten's dismal, misogynist production of the same in April.

[SJT]

"Always keep a hold of nurse
For fear of finding something worse"

See!?

We're missing the tirelessly-reviled Zambello already

[Yes Addison]

Until I read the follow-up comments, I assumed "a certain will-she, won't-she Russian soprano" was Poplavskaya. Has she sung anything by Puccini, while we're on the topic?

[Yes Addison]

Other than Liù, I mean.

[John]

I don't think so. She could be a really good Angelica. I wonder what her future plans are these days?

[Siggy]

Well apparently AG is doing something new...but not at ROH alas. She has just been announced as doing Charlotte in Werther in Vienna in 2015.

[John]

STOP PRESS: Gheorghiu new role shocker - Charlotte in Werther at the Wiener Staatsoper next year! Good for her.

[John Russell]

besides, D Oren is a complete ass: makes a mess of everything by racing through and treats solo artists with no respect, if he can get away with it.

[John Russell]

i should amend the preceding to:"... and HAS treated solo artists with a lack of respect, in rehearsal" instead of "and treats..." Mea culpa.

[Yes Addison]

Poplavskaya is two weeks away from her first (I think) Elisabeth in Tannhaeuser, co-starring the *other* Marina P., Marina Prudenskaya as Venus. Seiffert, Mattei, and Pape are the men; Barenboim conducts (Berlin). Then she has a Met Contessa Almaviva in the fall in the new Richard Eyre Figaro (a great cast, including Mattei and Abdrazakov), and (sigh) more Violettas shortly following, in the latest revival of the Decker production. There are a Tell and an Onegin coming up too, elsewhere. So, about half things that intrigue me and half roles I wish she'd stop accepting (things with elaborate virtuoso displays).