Domingo, “Di quella pira”
It’s time for an intervention, one that’s been a long time coming.
“Placido Domingo, having cracked at the close of “Di quella pira”, sent word to say that he was indisposed and needed our indulgence …”
Domingo may be, what they call, a “crack-head”. And this is no recent development either — that snippet of review by Andrew Porter was from the year 1973 … 1973! That means that Domingo’s been a “crack-head” for over thirty years! I didn’t even know there were “crack-heads” back in the 70’s — I thought they only had “pot-heads” back then. Frankly, I’m surprised no one has intervened sooner. Still, being a “crack-head” doesn’t seem to have hurt his career any. Luckily for Domingo, Marta is no Bobby Brown.
Thus, the NYCOF was happy to discover - tucked away in a remote corner of his collection - evidence of Domingo’s “Di quella pira” pre-crack, even if we had to go back to the late ’60’s to do so. At the time of this performance, Domingo hadn’t even reached the big 3-0 and the evils of crack were still a long way off — well, still a few years off, anyway. “Fresh” is the adjective that springs to mind. Enjoy.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Good looking guy, though, isn’t he?
Emma
“Charismatic”, especially with the ladies.
One of the greatest tenor of our days, and not only.
Who cares about crack notes!!!
Domingo’s voice is not very high. He is a dramatic tenor, which means his voice is heavy. In his younger days, he had a decent high C. In a 1982 Deutsche Grammaphone recording of “Di Quella Pira” his C is excellent and pinging. One only needs to hit a B in full voice to be considered a tenor. Gigli - who was a lighter voiced lyric tenor - never hit a C.
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