The Metropolitan Opera Summer Concert with Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna

The Met changed its policy for their summer in the parks concerts, instead of doing a concert version of a whole opera in several parks this year they choose a single concert with operas love couple Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna. Surprisingly they choose to have it in Prospect Park in Brooklyn rather than Central Park in Manhattan where almost all major concerts have been held in the past. Good news for us since we live near the main entrance to the park. They planned for 100,000 people to attend; they had 10 speaker towers and huge TV screens setup going back what seemed like quarter mile. I don’t think nearly that many people attended but there were thousands of us. We got to have our picnic near the stage since my wife and a friend volunteered to stake out a place for us 4 hours before the concert began. I was lucky all I had to do was stop home after work and carry the wine and food to our blanket.

The concert was made up of sentimental favorites for the most part, popular arias, duets and overtures from Verdi, Puccini, Donizetti, Bizet and Delibes. The music selected was perfect for a crowed of varied knowledge of opera. My guess that most people in the park had never been to an opera house. Even to those of us who go to more than 10 operas a year a smaltzy concert like this is fun. The Alganas (they are a married couple) are old fashioned in their sentimentality and especially Roberto is that way on stage in a role. There is a place for everything is this was the place for pure emotion. The combination of the music, evening and the wine that many people brought led to lots of hugging by young couples, and even to holding hands by us older couples. People who go to opera often let down their critical guard to feel like we did when we first heard it. Tears actually came to people eyes, you can’t really ask for more from art. That said the musical highlight of the evening was provided by both the Met Orchestra and Met Chorus as often happens in operas at the house itself. There “Va, pensiero” was especially good, I was sorry that they didn’t repeat it for the traditional encore.

The sound was good for this type of event; outdoor amplification has come a long way in the years since I first attend the Met in the Parks concerts. It made no real difference that we were near the stage the sound would have been the same a quarter mile back on the meadow. We could see musicians and 2 soloists clearly on the stage but my eyes were often seduced by the giant images on the jumbotron screens on either side of the stage. A pity since up there you could see that Angela and Roberto’s kisses were merely stage kisses. After a bunch of encores we walked back home down a familiar path on the side of the meadow, it seemed strange to see it so crowded at 10:30 at night. People were talking and smiling, it was nice watching everyone melting back into Prospect Heights after a fun evening of song.