Re: Kol Isha/Miriam's Song/Wagner

[Lori Cahan-Simon <l_cahan...>]

Marvin Margoshes wrote:

>----- Original Message -----
>From: "avi finegold" <afinegold (at) yahoo(dot)com>
>To: "World music from a Jewish slant" <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
>Sent: Monday, February 24, 2003 4:49 PM
>Subject: Re: Kol Isha/Miriam's Song/Wagner
>
>
>  
>
>>--- Marvin Margoshes <physchem (at) cloud9(dot)net> wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>My most recent exposure was at a NY Philharmonic
>>>concert where a fat lady
>>>sang a love song about her dying hero, from a Wagner
>>>opera.  The supertitles
>>>only made it worse (when the gadget worked at all)
>>>by showing that the
>>>lyrics were as ludicrous as the singer.  (I don't
>>>mean her voice.  I mean
>>>her appearance as a love image.)
>>>
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>hmmm.....do you mean that you cannot understand how
>>such banal lyrics can capture a feeling of love? i
>>think many including myself will argue with you.
>>Wagners big achievement was never that he wrote
>>brilliant dialogue, but that he wa able to use a
>>musical palette as a means for expressing emotions
>>that were overtly spoken in the libretto. i dont think
>>verdi or beethoven could have made shakespeare better.
>>theater is theater, opera libretti serve only to go
>>hand in hand with the score.
>>
>>or are you implying that a fat lady cannot be a love
>>image? i have a feeling that quite a few people on
>>this list would have a thing or two to say to you.....
>>
>>:)
>>    
>>
>This singer was beyond fat.  She was obese.  Her gown was a tent.  She was a
>caricature.  That kind of obesity is associated with breathing difficulties,
>medically called the Pickwickian syndrome.  I wondered at her ability to
>sustain a note.
>
>  
>
Do we really have to go there?  Fat/obese people can sing.  Fat/obese 
people love.  Fat/obese people love others, and yes, there are people 
who especially love fat/obese people of the opposite (and probably those 
who love the same) sex and find them very sexy.  Nothing to do with 
Jewish music in talking about fat people, unless we're talking about Fat 
Men and Women of Jewish Music.  Hey, maybe I'll give a conference on 
that topic!  ;-)

with love and shmalts,
Lorele

-- 
You can now hear Lori's new CD, Songs My Bubbe Should Have Taught Me; Vol.1: 
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