(photo Chad Pilster)
"Renowned opera singer Sherrill Milnes, background, listens as junior Ryne Cherry acts out the character Papageno from Mozart's 'The Magic Flute' on Friday during an opera master class at Stetson University in DeLand. Papageno is under a spell where his lips are locked. Once freed, he was able to sing for Milnes."
Link here. The most recorded American opera singer, Sherrill Milnes, spoke about a recent master class at Stetson University in Florida. The above picture leaves us wondering when a director is going to do a whole S&M version of Zauberflöte, where the three ladies are covered in head2toe leather bondage gear, and shove a ball gag in Papageno's mouth. Any takers?
Speakng of ideas that OC is too lazy to execute: Santeri Ojala, who was bullied off YouTube with claims of copyright infringement from various guitarists, has recently resurfaced. The 30-something Finnish media/guitar artist created the "Shreds" video series, where he takes classic concert footage shot at venues hosting Metallica, Guns N' Roses, Eric Clapton, etc...and overdubs the famous guitar solos with his own specially synched versions. His overdubbing is intentionally egregious, sloppy, and amateur, and he further expounds, "When I overdub, I like to leave the licks unfinished, over-bend, come up with stupid arpeggios, and throw in a borrowed riff or two." You can see some of his lol-worthy stuff on YouTube, his rendition of Paco De Lucia and of Eric Clapton.
Someone sooooo needs to do this with opera. Like take a pristine concert aria performance of Fleming, Florez, Netrebko, or Dessay, and synch it up with their own craptacular version, singing into Fruity Loops or Audacity or some crap and overlaying the tracks. This is an instant hit. Aida know. You'll be a YouTube ^*supahstah*^. Famous. On the internets. Like the Tron costume guy or Ellen Feiss or Mahir or Ill Mitch.