I am a middle-aged woman who dislikes verbal tricks, sloppy thinking, games playing, verbal abuse, and bigots.

I dislike them in those men and those women who employ them, which means that I don't like Camille Paglia or Ann Coulter either.

Do you fit into those categories? Calling RobinS a liar isn't the most civilized discourse I've ever heard. And slicing the qualifiers off arguments isn't the most honest discourse.

Put it this way: I distrust anyone who claims to hate or disdain an entire group. You cannot possibly know -- as you've informed me -- an entire group.

As for Perplexed Reader, if you have a story to tell, tell it. The other gentlemen (and if you're a lady, sorry, tell us yours) aren't shy.

>>>>>>>>Well, Scotto is naturally a slight woman. But damn is she a powerful one! (physically, as well as just intimidating and crazy and wonderful).>>>>>

I haven't met her. PRICE, now, is intimidating, but short. Scotto, like Sills, lost control of her vibrato. I heard her the year she was booed on opening night in NORMA. Had to sing "Casta Diva" pianissimo to control her vibrato. Actually, it worked nicely, but you could hear the clampdown.

>>>>>All these skinny, awful singers, it's a terrible trend. All they want is the skinniest singer, even if she's the worst. And tiny voices- so tiny they even thought of using amplificationat the Met and City Opera (they should only have the strikes that La Scala is having!)>>>>

No. No microphones in the Met, except for film or tape. If there's a riot, I'll help. I'd love to go to La Scala for opera as a contact sport. I was at TRISTAN when they booed one of Heppner's substitutes, and the opera-goers in the orchestra turned around and screamed at the balcony. Heppner croaked in QUEEN OF SPADES -- three times in Act II. He had a cold. Fragile guy. Dessay is skinny, but she can sing. Flores...heard him encore "ah mes amis..."

>>>>>>Male singers are sort of having the same thing- People like Erwin Schrott singing Don Giovanni, who do nothing but look muscular and stare at the conductor and mumble their diction.>>>>>

that's bad. At least, people will boo.

>>>>>>I used to like Hvorstovsky, but he doesn't have enough power. I did once yell to Thomas Allen that I want him to have my babies. The offer still stands. (Yes, he's an older man, he's in his 60s. I really don't care). It would still stand for Kurt Moll if he wasn't so nutso- at his last Abduction at the Met, he got a standing ovation after the act2 aria, and he gave a little bow as he walked upstage. classic.>>>>

Met Sherrill Milnes. He's in his late 70s and he's still a fox.

>>>>>>Oh, and Rene Pape, funniest 4Villains ever, and classic Sprecher.>>>>>

Great. Just heard him this year for the first time.

>>>>>>Geez, all you guys complaining, I'm sitting her salivating over men in their 40s-80s! ;)>>>>

Domingophile, much? I am.

>>>>>How was Damnation? Wasn't John singing Mephistopheles in that? I really wanted to see it. (he may be pretty, but he's also insanely talented, excluding him from the group mentioned above)>>>>>

Oh YEAH. Very much a French singer, very ironic. That was a wild production, and I enjoyed it immensely. Lepage's Ring will be soemthing to see.

If you're talking pretty and talented, Ramey in his early career. Heard him as Kutuzov: heavily costumed, a little wobbly, but screamed SLAVA anyhow.

>>>>>>>Giordani I don't care so much about. He's just another rediculous tenor (silly tenor, balls are for men!). So, I'm convinced, is Thomas Hampson.>>>>>

Now that's not fair. Granted, I'm prejudiced. He's a friend of a friend, and he discussed his interpretation of Pinkerton with me. He's a thoughtful man.

>>>>>>And for Elizabetta, I'm still partial to that old DVD with Karita Mattila (queen of all things).>>>

ROFL!

>>>>>>Sorry to have gone so far off topic...>>>>

Oh tough.

You're missing Palumbo's chorus. It is incredible, especially in FAUST. And Ozawa and Barenboim ruffling up Levine's sonorous orchestra.

When I'm writing that dispassionately, I am dispassionate in order to get the syntax right.

Can you say the same?

Have I considered therapy? Don't you consider that a personal question?

You're making a few assumptions here -- that you can diagnose who does and does not need it, that you can detect self-hate (try Brightstar for that), and that "have you considered therapy" is one of those things that's going to make women cry.

I am a conventional, aware, single woman in NYC. What do you know about NYC? If you know it, you know that many women in that category are IN therapy. If you don't, now you do.

Have -you- considered therapy for delusions of grandeur and attempts at verbal abuse?

BTW, two of the women you're probably stigmatizing as hating men -- you want to edit that and say that Lifelike and I are turning male opera singers into sex symbols? How objectifying!

I can barely imagine the heartbreak. I prepared for years to become a teaching and research scholar in medieval studies, only to run into the PhD glut. I resigned a tenure track position because I saw no money and no future. It's the closest I want to come to divorce.

Singing -- that would be worse, in my opinion. But the scholarship itself would be good discipline; and there is accomplishment in scholarship. It's not the first best, though. But since scholarship is a thing I know, it's a thing I suggest.

"Advanced" cases too.

Buy-BYE, "Doctor" Map.

Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.

Psssst. Anyone think he's really gone? I think he's lurking, like the demons in ZAUBERFLOETE. (and no, I am NOT whistling Mozart!)