As previously I made my own lists before the official announcements. It wads a little trickier than the art song competition because I really had no sense of how the judges would react to the loud but unexpressive Koreans. There is after all a need in opera for powerful low voices even if they aren’t great actors. So I made them a separate category. So then, my guesses:
Probables: Bahg, Brancy, Chaieb, D’Angelo, Haji, Lee, Nekoranec, Nilsson, Yang
Maybes: Golovushkin, Hovhannisyan, Kyreiev, Mathieu, Mihaylov, Sproule
Probably nots: Idrisova, Koval, Margison, Muhire, Rudyk, Yangel
Fafners: Cho, Choi, Gil
I wasn’t far off. The judges choice of the twelve semifinalists was:
- Bahg
- Brancy
- Chaieb
- Choi (the only “Fafner” to make the cut)
- D’Angelo
- Golovushkin
- Haji
- Idrisova
- Lee
- Mihaylov
- Nekoranec
- Yang
Only Idrisova surprises me but she is a very different type of singer from anyone else we heard which is rather where surprises happen.
So, nine guys, four of them Korean, and only three gals. It’s an unusual field now. No classic light lyric sopranos and few lyric baritones but lots of really low voices.
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Very difficult choices judges have to make for sure…but I find it very surprising Nilsson wasn’t chosen. Sure, everyone has their ‘taste’ etc but she seemed to clearly to stand out vocally…and was good expressively as well. That one is a real head-scratcher. What was the buzz on her not being chosen in Montreal?
No buzz really. Maybe today. Everyone is just too tired by the time the announcements are made!