Netrebko Sings Rachmaninov, and Pushkin

Dear Deb,

Thank you for the wonderful Christmas gift. It is Anna Netrebko in perfect form. I have been enamoured with her voice for about a year now, ever since I heard her sing I Puritani. She is the perfect diva!

But this recording is perfectly perfect with the Russian singer singing Russian songs. It feels like she is at home in the living room back in Krasnodar wearing slippers and performing not for an audience of critics but for Aunt Tanya, or her father (who, she says she chats with everyday), or Erwin.

Perhaps this is so good, so удобный, because she is working with Valery Gergiev, the conductor she looks upon as a godfather. I'm not sure why, but this album really works. Thank you for discovering it for me.

My favorite on the album (The Russian Album) is the Rachmaninov setting of Pushkin's "Don't Sing to Me." It is moving.

Ne poy, krasavica op. 4, no. 4



My beauty, do not sing for me
The songs of Georgia, of grievance:
My thoughts immediately flee
To another life and shores in distance.

They bring to me -- your cruel tunes --
Alas, the sad and clear vision:
The steppe, the night -- under the moon,
The poor and very distant virgin.

While seeing you, I could forget
The image so sad and fair,
But, look, you sing -- and it is set
Again before my eyes in air.

My beauty, do not sing for me
The songs of Georgia, of grievance:
My thoughts immediately flee
To another life and shores in distance.

-A. Pushkin

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By the way, did you know that Anna's been cancelling shows lately? She's pregnant. You know I like that.

I love you darling. And thanks again.

MOM
XOX