4 OCT 06: WHEN DIVAS ATTACK

It's not always easy to say "I told you so" - but after reading what I read and hearing what I heard Tuesday, it's tempting. After what two opera stars did at the RiverCenter last weekend, let's all be thankful Frederica von Stade did not hear her last name mispronounced on television [22 Sep]....

People who were at the RiverCenter last Saturday night are telling the same story Brad Barnes did in Tuesday's Ledger-Enquirer: Frederica von Stade and Kiri Te Kanawa stopped their concert after only one song, because of distractions in the audience. Why, they hardly ever let "one-hit wonders" perform at the Phenix City Amphitheater anymore.

The classical concert reportedly was stopped because someone brought a baby to one of the box seats at the RiverCenter. Part of me wants to have compassion on this grown-up. It's hard for many people in Columbus to afford a RiverCenter box seat ticket AND a babysitter, too.

The opera divas reportedly returned to the stage after a pause, and explained to the audience that you don't bring babies to a classical music concert. Perhaps someone should have told them what former Governor Zell Miller did -- giving all new and expecting parents classical albums, to help babies learn faster.

But that wasn't all. Apparently a number of RiverCenter concert-goers took their cell phones into the hall, and snapped pictures of the sopranos as they sang. One person's phone reportedly even rang! Other musical "divas" wouldn't have minded this a bit - you know, like Janet Jackson or Gretchen Wilson.

Based on what Brad Barnes wrote in the newspaper, at least Frederica von Stade and Kiri Te Kanawa were polite with the RiverCenter crowd. They explained their objections without getting in a huff - and to borrow from Groucho Marx, they didn't stomp out in a minute-and-a-huff....

Since I've sung classical music in chorales, I can see this situation from both sides of the footlights. Our college choir director actually paused before the final movement at a concert one spring, turned to the audience and said: "Will the woman with the baby please leave the hall, so it doesn't ruin our recording COMPLETELY?!"

Some people in the concert hall applauded when our choir director said that - but that was more than 25 years ago. Haven't times changed in classical music since then? After all, many operas now have "super-titles" translating French or Italian into English. And George del Gobbo sometimes acts really goofy on TV, to sell Columbus Symphony tickets.

As a singer, I know it's important to focus on the music when you're singing a classical or sacred piece. You listen to the instruments, you watch the conductor closely - and you quietly pray no one standing on the riser above yours loses their balance, and falls over on your shoulders.

Yet what the sopranos did at the RiverCenter shows how the word "diva" became associated with opera singers, and NOT in a positive way. Maria Callas (and to some extent in recent years Kathleen Battle) gained reputations for having a bit of attitude. But it was aimed more toward conductors than the audience - as if they wanted to point a baton VERY closely in the other direction.

To be honest, many classical performers who appear "elitist" on stage simply are putting up a front. I was stunned in college to stand in a choir behind a big-city philharmonic orchestra, and see several instrumentalists with "Time" magazine on their music stands. They didn't even read "Opera News...."

(Then there was the Midwestern music hall where several members of the orchestra went to a dressing room during intermission -- and played poker. For these guys, "four-four time" meant a raise of 1,000 chips.)

What happened last weekend could hurt the RiverCenter's reputation a bit, in terming of future classical concerts. The word about halls and audiences WILL get around, in any form of the music business - or have you noticed Leroy Van Dyke is singing at the Georgia National Fair, and skipped the Greater Columbus Fair?

Yet the problems of last Saturday night are fixable, if the RiverCenter will make a few small adjustments. From my years attending and taking parts in concerts, I'd be happy to help....

+ Have a separate enclosed room for parents with small children. It could have a closed-circuit TV camera for watching the performers - as long as people don't sneak in the room with their OWN cameras, to make bootleg videotapes.

+ Do what major concert halls such as the Woodruff Arts Center in Atlanta and the old Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, California have done. Check all cameras outside -- and in 2006, check the cell phones as well. If you really need to know a football score, you can check at intermission.

+ Have classical performers step outside the dressing room BEFORE the show, for autographs and picture-posing. Have them mingle with the fans. After all, some of them draw bigger crowds in Columbus than professional baseball players.

E-MAIL UPDATE: Now our sub-shop dinner theater presents, "The Card Trick":

Make sure when you use your debit card in a restaurant it is returned to you...Seems a local sub shop cashier wrapped the receipt to look as if the card was inside. Saturday morning the bank called ..oops..between 9 PM and 10AM the next morning almost a $800 had been spent..Guess what,the manager of the sub shop says he has the thief of the card all on tape..What a class act the manager and owner of the restaurant have been through all this..One illegal charge was food from McDonald's....Guess they were tired of subs..

Here's hoping our e-mailer has his or her card back by now. Here's hoping the cashier is behind bars, or at least making restitution. And here's hoping McDonald's knows better, than to use this in commercials counterattacking Jared the Subway guy.

But I wonder where this card-snatcher spent $800 in Columbus between 9:00 at night and 10:00 in the morning. You'd think the Wal-Mart staff would ask questions about someone buying a big television set at 1:00 a.m.

SONG OF THE DAY: Oakland edged Minnesota 3-2 to open the major league baseball playoffs Tuesday. That made me think of the Columbus native who hit two home runs for the A's - and believe it or not, "Jingle Bells":

Oakland won! Oakland won! Oakland won today!

Big Frank's in the lineup - and this year he will play-ay!

Oakland won! Oakland won! If they win twice more,

They'll play the Yankees - and on Fox-54!

Thousands of visitors read this blog every month, in Columbus and around the world. To advertise to them, offer a story tip or comment on this blog, write me - but be warned, I may post your e-mail comment and offer a reply.

BURKARD BULK MAIL INDEX: 6789 (+ 185, 2.8%)

If you mention this blog in public, please be polite enough to let me know.

© 2003-06 Richard Burkard, all rights reserved.