At the Sao Carlos

At the Sao Carlos one experiences ancient music the way it was played in the days of Mozart, when most orchestra players were moonlighting footmen who got extra two florins a year to blow horns or saw wood. Like in those days, during Sao Carlo concerts the orchestra members whisper to each other, chew Nicorette and sneak out for a quick puff while their instrument is temporarily not needed. The conductor does his utmost to motivate them to a greater effort, by gesticulating and grimacing, but no amount of jumping up and hand-waving seems to raise the strings out of their sexless whining even though, to make the task easier, whole pages of Agrippina are skipped and most arias (being da capo they have the A-B-A structure) are cut to just A. (Except those of the male soprano who likes to hear himself sing). (He and his mother make two). Lady B asks, and she has a point, how one can skip arias or cut them by two thirds. Would it not be better to play something easier? The Nutcracker, say?

The interior of the theater remains loyal to the old days, too: its unadulterated baroque beats the bejeezus out of the bechagalled modernist Opera Garnier.