A momentarily clothed Anna Netrebko has a Marxist moment & tells the Tagesspiegel all about the joys of growing up as a singer in the USSR, and cheerfully adds that "honestly, we used to sing a lot of songs against you Germans, until 1986-1988 at least":
We had many musicals in Russia, I saw many of them. The words were nice and innocent, a bit naive, or story of heroes. We grew up in a different time. We had to read books about heroes a lot.
...
We sang all gathered under the flag, in the camp, we stood and saluted the flags, we wore red handkerchiefs around our necks... But it was fun. There was nothing mean about it, no aggression. We didn't know what had happened in the time of Stalin, we just knew that the future would be great. Everyone would be happy, no differences between the rich and the poor. That idea was fantastic, regardless of all the other stuff. The songs were great, too.
Unlike happy Rolando "I Sing In The Shower, In The Car, In My Sleep" Villazon, a man who says Anna "is so much different than I am" (huh), la Netrebka only sings when she's on stage (ie, when she gets paid for it): "I never sing at parties".
And let's hear it from Anna re: Rolando's recent candid statements about the ugly business of the marketing of opera singers:
Rolando Villazón said recently that he is not just a singer, but also a product. Do you feel that way, too, sometimes?
Sometimes? (laughs) But on the other hand I must say that without the media it would not be possible to reach the kind of fame you can reach nowadays. If you were however only a product, without charisma and talent, you'd disappear fast.
When asked a pretty loaded question about an old Cecilia Bartoli snark (a German paper had asked her if she'd rather have Netrebko's voice or her legs, and La Ceci very cannily and snarkily answered that you cannot separate the two), Netrebko responds calmly that she'd like to have Bartoli's energy. huh.
More later about a big Anna slam in the press.