For those of you who have had your fill of writing and videos and all that about Glass and Orphée, here's your weekly assortment from Operaman's grab bag of opera ephemera.

Happy Birthday!
Ursula K. Le Guin is 80 years young today! Avid readers among you will know Ms Le Guin as one of the world's foremost writers of fantasy and science fiction novels. She has almost innumerable awards to her name, including five Hugos and 6 Nebulas. She was born and raised in Berkeley, California, but has made Portland her home since 1958.
What fewer of you will know is that she and her charming husband, historian Charles Le Guin, to whom she has been married for well over fifty years, are wonderful supporters of the Portland Opera. I had personal experience of this when I worked in the opera's patron services department and would speak to them both on a fairly regular basis.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish her many happy returns and much joy in her future.

Who's next - the ushers?
I expect you remember all the fuss there was when Luc Bondy and the production crew of the current Met production of Tosca were roundly booed on opening night. The next production to hit the boards was Verdi's Aida and guess what - this time the peanut gallery booed the conductor, Daniele Gatti! We get to see this production on Saturday as a Met HD transmission at the movie theater. Don't expect any booing there.

So you wanna be an opera singer? Fuggeddaboudit!
I mean all that public adulation and stuff is all very well but why not go where the money is, and become a stage hand? Last year, the prop master at Carnegie Hall earned a nifty $530,044 while the two staff carpenters and two staff electricians had to scrape by on a paltry $430,543 apiece. And what do they do for all this lovely moolah?

Producers who work there said a prop manager usually moves and supervises the moving of objects that aren’t plugged in, such as a piano or music stands. An electrician handles objects that get plugged in, like microphones and amplifiers, while carpenters are involved in the construction and handling of scenery.

Oh,well, if he's got to shift music stands then I can see why he would need to be paid just about two and a half times as much as John Roberts, the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court. And just in case you think I am joking or exaggerating - Here it is in writing.

Opera Theater Oregon presents not-your-granddad's Beggar's Opera!
Portland's other opera company, Opera Theater Oregon is presenting its next extravaganza, the Beggar's Opera and it opens on Thursday of this week. I thought I knew this work rather well as, when I was but a pimply 13 year-old I was cast as Lucy Locket in our school production. This was, you understand, because the production was at an all-boy's school and not as a result of my begging the drama teacher to let me wear women's clothes just 'cos I liked the idea. Anyway. We did the original version written by John Gay and Dr Pepusch in 1728. It was cute and very 18th century and stuff. 'Sort of Merchant Ivory on a budget of two hundred quid and change. I was, therefore, delighted when I heard OTO would present it. And now I find that this production is in no way similar to the opera I knew and I can barely contain my excitement! I was going to write about it for you at some length but my chum Bob Kingston has covered the topic much better than I ever could over on his blog Dramma Per Musica so you should just go there and read his three-part interviews. Then buy your tickets. I understand that advance sales are better than for any previous OTO production evah, so waste not a moment in securing your seat. If you want to puchase online, go HERE.

Ah, but can he play Lady of Spain?
Every now and again I come across a video on YouTube that, whether or not has anything to opera, I just have to share with you. Here is one of those. I sat and watched it and laughed almost continually throughout - not with mirth but with amazement and sheer joy at what I was seeing and hearing. I defy you not to be moved by this. It isn't a party trick, it is musicianship of the highest order.

I sent it to an old friend John Geordiadis who for many years was the concert master of the London Symphony Orchestra and so knows a thing or two about playing Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto. He emailed me back almost immediately declaring it to be "Amazing!" and saying he was going to send it around to his other friends. For those of you whose reading of cyrillic script is a tad rusty, the lad's name is Alexander Hrustevich. He also plays Vivaldi's Four Seasons - Spring and Summer with the left hand, Fall and Winter with the right. Okay I am kidding about the last bit but he does play the Vivaldi.

I wonder how much the stage manager got for blowing up all those balloons? Less than the Carnegie Hall guy, I'll bet you.

What's a few bucks between friends?
This week Plácido Domingo  became the very first recipient of the Birgit Nilsson Prize, at one million dollars the richest prize in classical music. Ms Nilsson herself both founded the prize and chose its first recipient. There has been some muttering in the ranks about how Maestro Domingo needs another million bucks like most of us need another tax demand and that the money would have been better spent had it been awarded to some young impecunious but up-and-coming singer. Okay, I see the argument but the steam was kinda taken out of the whiners' sails when Domingo announced that he would use that money to establish another prize, this one for Wagnerian singers. I mean it's thoroughly laudable and everything, but is it not just a tad strange that Maestro. Domingo would use this money to found another prize? Perhaps the winner of that prize will use the prize money to found yet another prize for, say, Handelian Counter-tenors. Of course maybe I just being snarky to cover up my guilt at knowing that if I had won a million bucks I would go par-tay!!

Okay, that's it for this week. Go have fun, be happy and productive.