Barber and Snow

3-18-07 SHORT HILLS: The middle of the week was beautiful. The temps were in the 70’s and the snow melted. The breezes were warm on your cheek. That is my definition of spring, by the way. But—now we are back in winter with more shoveling, plowing, cold wind, boots and gloves. Here is the reason we call them snowdrops:


Last night Judy and I hosted Val and Steve, Alison and Dan, and Maggie, Lily and Anna at the Met for “Il Barbiere di Siviglia” by Gioachino Rossini with Peter Mattei, Juan Diego Florez, Joyce DiDonato, John Del Carlo and John Relyea as the principals and Maurizio Benini as conductor. It is a new production, but not the premiere, and will be video-casted in movie theaters next weekend. We all loved it. I thought the restored aria added by Florez before the end went on too long, but what do I know? We had dinner before the opera at Fiorello’s across the street from Lincoln Center. The restaurant is a favorite of ours and lived up to its usual standards. I could eat there a couple times a week.

For anyone interested, here are a couple wikipedia references to Bearmarchais, the author of the play that Rossini adapted in creating Barbiere:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Beaumarchais
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Mère_coupable