CVH ON THE ROAD IS MOVING AGAIN

I am tired of Blogger and am jumping ship. You can find CVH ON THE ROAD HERE now. I will leave this link up for a while. www.christianvanhorn.tumblr.com is our new home.

Ich bin in Berlin

Raced into Berlin late last night after a very successful performance of Verdi's Requiem in Hof. Hof is a great little town in the northern-most west side of Bavaria...so the beer was still good!

Arrived in Berlin at about 1:00am this morning. We had an early rehearsal today and will have our second requiem tonight. Tonights requiem is for charity www.innocenceindanger.de/ and its great to be a part of it.

Clothes getting ripped off on DVD...

A new DVD release of Lucrezia Borgia from the Bayerische Staatsoper staring Edita Gruberova. Another great opportunity to see CVH have his wig and costume torn off. I just layed eyes on the DVD and the quality is really great. The sound is also perfect. This is a Christof Loy production and I was very pleased to be a small part of it.

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Stuttgart Aida and the dancing cheerleaders

The slaves in this production of Aida were cheerleaders complete with pom-poms and leotards. It was a stranger take on Aida but I imagine I was a little bias since I only came to the show the day before. A very quick staging rehearsal and curtain went up. Its always exciting to meet colleagues on stage. This King was aged a bit as you can see above. The idea was that this King was more like a politician. My costume was more the commander of the navy. All in all a good, fun trip to Stuttgart and a couple of successful shows. Got to meet some new friends and I look forward to going back in a few months for a run of Figaros. Up next is two Verdi Requiems. Always a great time. First one is in Hof, Germany on Saturday and the next day in Berlin.

Catching the flu in Rome

Or at least on the airplane coming home. Its been a rough few days but I think the worst is behind me. I had the dreaded visit to the Munich Work Permit/Residence Permit/Every other Permit office today otherwise know as the KVR Kreisfervaltungsreferat. This place is like a fun-house. Long white corridors, lots of closed doors, many foreigners with dictionaries in their hands trying to figure out what floor they need to be on. Its like alice in wonderland meets Clock Work Orange. Nothing goes correctly in this place. Imagine the American DMV only its in a foreign language. Thats right...the DMV where everyone hates their life. I fully intended to go this morning and after waiting 2 hours be told that what I needed would be impossible. Torture+Confusion+Dissapointment=KVR

I was wonderfully surprised today. I needed a small amendment to my work permit and this was done instantly. Unbelievable. This is probably my 6th visit to the KVR since living in Munich and it has NEVER gone this well. Even with the flu I danced out of that place! I am now cleared for Stuttgart and ready for some Aida!

Here is our cast in Stuttgart

Il Re Christian Van Horn
Amneris Marina Prudenskaja / Chariklia Mavropoulou
Aida María José Siri
Radamès Héctor Sandoval
Ramfis Liang Li / Attila Jun
Amonasro Yalun Zhang

I am not normally a big fan of being a tourist, but Rome makes it feel ok. The Coliseum today was amazing. I immediately wanted to come home and see Gladiator again. I read that in the first 100 days that the place was open...2000 men and 9000 animals were killed on the floor. They sprayed perfume to cover the stench of blood. Walking around on 2000 year old ruins is an indescribable feeling. Magical place.

Hall of Fame of Cool entry 1

Entry 1) Johnny Cash. In death- still cooler than most.

U-Bahn Anarchy

It felt extreme......but OK. Why not? I have never seen anyone smash anything in Munich but apparently there is a sect of folks encouraging it. I am trying to imagine life where everything is smashed. I am not sure the person who tagged this really thought it through. Smash....everything? Come on. What would you deface with your sharpie?

I am posting a painting today. I painted it yesterday...and I don't hate it. I sort of hate it...but not all the way.

Damnation on the Docket

I have been spending my few days off studying Damnation of Faust. Berlioz is growing on me more and more and the fantastic story of Faust will never disappoint. Hard to imagine that October is already half gone. It has been snowing in Munich off and on for the last couple of days. Feels a bit early for snow. I wonder if that means we are in for a long winter? I could really do with out that. Staying in Chicago for Jan and February seems like enough winter for anyone.

Not a whole lot to announce on the opera front. I have, however, just recently signed a contract to work with a new opera house next fall that is a long way from here. Always great to add new cities and opera houses to the list. Can't quite announce where or what it is yet....but hopefully soon. The Opera companies always reserve the right to be the first to announce there seasons. Gotta play by the rules.

Final performance of Carmen last night. By far the best of the three performances (at least from where I was standing) Great crowd-really nice reception at the end. The picture above is from last night. Christian Rieger, myself and Ted Rhodes after the curtain call. For me its the last performance at the Bayerische Staatsoper for a while. My next performance in Munich is not until December 6th when we open Die Zauberflöte. Until then I have two Verdi requiems and a couple of Aidas. It will be a very merry Verdi November for me.

Its officially fall in Munich. The leaves are falling and the air is getting cool. My favorite time of year.

Final Lucrezia last night

Last Lucrezia went very well and the crowd was really excited as usual with Lucrezia. I think this has been a very successful show and that is due in large part to Ms. Gruberova and our wonderful director Christof Loy (who by the way has a website almost as cool as mine). The audience gave the show a standing ovation last night and the energy felt really high. So now we say goodbye to one production for the season and move on to our Carmens. One tonight and then again two days later. Finally rained in Munich yesterday. Easily the first rain since we got back early September. We have been very lucky up until now. Perhaps fall is now here. A small shout out to my beautiful bride who celebrated 8 years with me yesterday. This fancy opera life wouldn't exist without her...

Our Cast for tonights Carmen

Zuniga Christian Van Horn

Moralès Nikolay Borchev

Don José José Cura

Escamillo Teddy Tahu Rhodes

Dancairo Christian Rieger

Remendado Kevin Conners

Frasquita Lana Kos

Mercédès Heike Grötzinger

Carmen Julia Gertseva

Micaela Maija Kovalevska

Clothes getting ripped off...

...for the last time tonight in Lucrezia Borgia. This is my farewell performance as Astolfo and I will most likely not miss it. Just being honest. Its a great production and a lot of fun. The audience always loves it and I was really happy to get to know this piece. I really had no knowledge of it prior. I only knew that it needed an incredible soprano (which we have in Ms. Gruberova) and had a very good bass aria (absolutely dominated by Franco Vassallo). Two more Carmens after tonight and then we are moving on for a while. CVH Back on the road.

Pics from my dressing room...

Very good opening last night. I will say that the audience was a bit quiet throughout the show. Carmen is the greatest hits show and the audience usually knows exactly when to applaud. They seemed apprehensive about bursting into applause. Usually just waiting for someone around them to start and then the applause would start rolling. As a singer I will tell you we feel that on stage. Energy from the audience (for me anyway) translates into my own energy. The pictures are from the dressing room immediately following the show. My costume uniform hanging is the closest military uniform I will ever get to wear. The final Lucrezia Borgia is tomorrow night and most definitely my last as Astolfo. I will miss the Mario Brothers costume.

Come see CVH get tied up!

Thats right-...tied up and carried off. It takes 4 full size men to lift the chair I am tied to and carry it off stage tonight. Carmen opens up tonight with two more performances to follow. The final performance on October 10th will be my last in Munich for a couple of months. I will be in Hof and Berlin with a couple of Verdi Requiems with the Hof Symphoniker and also Stuttgart for two performances of Aida with the Staatsoper Stuttgart. We get back to Munich in December for Die Zauberflöte to start up.

Carmen opens tomorrow in Munich. The picture on the left is me and Denyce Graves from a Carmen production in Chicago. Carmen is always a good time and the audience will undoubtably love it. We have a really good cast this go around.

Carmen Julia Gertseva
Micaela Maija Kovalevska

Escamillo Teddy Tahu Rhodes

and some guy named Cura singing Don Jose.

Carmen Sitz Number 2

Heading out to Carmen Sitzprobe number two this morning. It's rare in a repertoire house to get so much orchestra time. It is always exciting to hear the Carmen overture with such a wonderful orchestra. Our performances begin on Sunday with a matinee and I believe that there are three performances in October and then it comes back again later in the year with some new cast members. During down time in these rehearsals I am studying my Damnation of Faust score. It has been a while since I have really enjoyed getting into a score this much. I am excited to be in Chicago in a few months for this new production.

Had our Carmen sitzprobe this morning with a very wonderful cast. More Carmen rehearsal this evening and our third Lucrezia Borgia after that. Pretty busy for a Thursday.

Munich has been really crazy the last few weeks. It is of course Oktoberfest time and reportedly 6.5 million people come into town for the festival. Munich's population is under 1.5 million so you can imagine how crowded it feels at times. We of course donned our traditional clothing and had to experience an 8 Euro Mass under a huge tent of singing tourists. (with the occasional Bavarian too) Hard to believe that it is already Oct 1st! Next month is Verdi Requiems in Hof and Berlin and and then Aida's in Stuttgart. Time flying by.

Propaganda

several years ago at an audition for a very famous Maestro I handed him a packet of materials before I sang. He said “ahhh...here is the propaganda...” He could not have been more right. Everything in that packet was positive. I always think about that moment and smile. Go to any singer website and you will find positive after positive reviews. I assure you we get bad ones too. In fact sometimes the bad one can be quoted to sound positive in a way. You are not going to be everyones favorite and often times we get 10 great reviews and 1 terrible one. You wonder if everyone was at the same performance. So to this end I renamed my reviews page “propaganda” because you will only find the positive stuff about me there. For the most part I do get good reviews. Generally reviewers will concentrate on the tenor and soprano and leave their words for the bass for the end. When its a new production in Germany 90% of the article is on the production leaving a bit at the end for the performers. So to prove that we do get bad reviews too I will qoute one here:

This review came from a website called Ionarts.com and the reviewer goes by JFL. The review is in reference to the Aida we did last summer in München.

“Christian Van Horn’s King was unmusical in his haphazard approximation of low notes, but...he improved with time.”

I framed this review and put it on my wall. I have never been called unmusical before and it made me laugh. Like I said you can’t please everyone and some listeners will just think you are “unmusical”.

So I now feel like I have shared some honesty here. Like I said, generally reviewers are kind to me but on occasion some will come and bring me back to reality. I assure you EVERY singer at some point has had a bad review. I will leave all the good reviews on my Propaganda page and continue to call it that. The Bad ones will just remain framed on my wall...