A Night at the Opera

I left you in Paris on a perfect autumn afternoon, conjuring up the mood with the Kinks, Autumn Almanac, sitting on the fourth floor of an hotel near the Sorbonne: open balcony, legs stretched out,  IPad on knee, drink in hand, sun streaming in, waiting for Robert to arrive from London. Sometimes this website misleads, so far, it’s for real. 

We walked over to the Île Saint-Louis for an early dinner and on to the Bastille for La traviata. Funny thing opera: I’d seen it with Robert at Holland Park in May this year. Opera is a peculiar and, for me, a special medium. The orchestra, the chorus and the principal singers transcend the production but the production can, usually, make it crash and burn or, sometimes, bring a new perspective to an old war horse. Well, this time it was fine – although most of the party at the Ball were wearing stove-pipe hats and there were jolly few ladies. It was like a convention of chimney cleaners’ and undertakers.

The singing was world class, as you’d expect in a subsidised opera house. The production was acceptable, unlike la Boheme at the same venue last Christmas

I remember seeing La traviata at the Met a few years ago in a production singled out because Placido Domingo sang the baritone role, Giorgio Germont. A friend says he buys “listening seats” so he’s not distracted by the on-stage rubbish. 

On Tuesday morning, and this is probably feeble, there didn’t seem an obvious exhibition so we walked through the Jardin des Luxembourg. There was lots of stuff to photograph and write about but I reckoned I was on holiday. I especially liked the sign saying that  sitting on the grass is permitted. Signs like that make me glad we are (sort of) leaving the EU.