Thursday the 29th was a big day for me! For all the times that Lorna and Melissa had asked "Remind me again why we're not in Italy?" this was it, to be in Munich at the Bayernstaatsoper to see the incomparable tenor Jonas Kaufmann in Pagliacci!
But I woke up at 4:30 AM violently ill. The norovirus that had tormented Lorna and Melissa had finally come for me. By now I knew the behavior, so I ate nothing at all and had only sips of water all day. I had bought five excellent tickets at €200 each and I had structured the vacation to see this opera, and this opera house, one of only two remaining on my tour of the great opera houses of Europe. This gave me the discipline to endure, in the hope of being well enough to see the show.
I didn't leave the hotel until 5:30 for the 6:00 PM show. I was weak, but I knew I could make it through the next few hours without rushing to the toilet. That was critically important, because once the curtain goes up you cannot go out and return, you stay out until the intermission.
Even more than that, as in Paris, the seats are so close together that it's hard to get in and out unless other people are doing the same. Trying to get out to a toilet in a rush would have been very difficult in those dark, tight quarters.
The show was a common double-feature referred to as the Cav-Pag, for the two short operas that make it up: Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci. Cavalleria Rusticana was one of the first operas I ever listened to, and it is one that hooked me on opera so long ago. Kaufmann had the leading role in Pagliacci, and it had been a bucket-list item for me for years to hear him sing Vesti la giubba in Pagliacci.
Owen and Brigitte spent the day at the Englische Garten before joining me in front of the opera house. Lorna and Melissa were still resting, much improved but unable to commit to sitting in one place for 3 hours.
That left me with two extra tickets, bought for €200 each. Out on the front steps with the other scalpers, I met a nice retiree couple looking for tickets. They had two already, but mine were better, and they wanted their daughter Sophie and granddaughter Emma to see the show too. I sold them the tickets at half-price and we were all happy.
The show was brilliant! In many of the shows we've seen, the director (in charge of acting and staging, not singing) have made changes that often are merely irksome but are sometimes loathe some (last year in Venice the Teatro La Fenice gave Don Giovanni a happy ending!) The Bayern Staatsoper put on two fine productions with only minimal changes, the biggest one being that Turridu survives the climactic knife fight so he could run away and join the circus - and be used in Pagliacci the same evening!
But by the end I was pretty well exhausted. Owen and Brigitte and I chatted about it on the walk back to the hotel, but I wasn't up to anything else. I had a half of a boring sandwich at a bar near the hotel, hoped for the best, and went to bed.