Stu News and Photos

As a preamble, to those who read this, our family has been hit with a head-cold, felling us like dominoes. Noe is fully recovered, Nich is on his way, maybe he's passed the half-way mark, Leslie is doing better, but a little more coughy than Nich, and I am the rotten egg, having been hit with it last. It hasn't hit me as hard as the others, due, I assume, to my charm and savoir-faire. Nothing dramatic about any of this, but if you've noticed we've been a little out of the press lately, this is why.

As Leslie and Nich took the brunt of it over the weekend, there was a lot of laying around, watching films. Mostly Harry Potter, as Noe is on a binge lately, like some extended Harry Potter lost weekend. (In fact, much to my surprise, I've been so affected by her devotion that I've started reading the series. While I enjoy reading quite a bit, fantasy is not my cup of tea. The Harry Potter series was something I just thought I'd take a pass on, but I found myself watching these films with Noe and asking so many questions that I realized the only choice I had was to start reading the novels.)

But that's not what I came here to tell you about.

After so many Harry Potter films, I wanted a respite, so I turned on The Fifth Element, my favorite science fiction film. While watching the scene with Plavalaguna performing that wonderful version of Il dolce suono, I was reminded of how beautiful I found the original opera, Lucia di Lammermoor. It's story is reminiscent of Romeo & Juliet, so if you haven't experienced this opera yet, you may well enjoy the plot as well as the soaring arias. Which is what I came here to tell you about. I'd like to share with you a performance of the original composition "Lucia di Lammermoor," and Spargi d'amaro pianto, in English: The Mad Scene. In this scene, Lucia has gone so far 'round the bend that she experiences a full-bore hallucination where she thinks she is going to marry the man she loves, even though he's dead. Pretty moving stuff. -- For those of you who are fans of The Fifth Element, you will undoubtadly recognize the aria.