I was poking around Amazon yesterday, and among other things I wanted to check out a recital by Patricia Brooks that has just been released. I had never heard of her, but the disc was getting raves. When I typed in her name, one of the choices was a recording of Robert Ward's The Crucible. I hadn't realized there was a recording, much less one featuring someone I had just heard about for the first time. I also hadn't really heard of the operatic version of The Crucible until Trinity Lyric had to substitute it for the previously announced Nixon in China. (You know that weird thing when you've never heard of something, and then you hear about it two or three times in as many days? This is sort of a double version.)
I didn't buy anything then, partly because I've been on a CD-buying binge and am trying to stop (maybe just one more! just one!) and partly because I was trying to decide if I wanted to hear The Crucible before seeing it -- if I'm going to an opera I'm unfamiliar with I will sometimes purposely avoid hearing the music or reading the libretto beforehand, just so I can discover it in the theater. So I went back to Amazon tonight, because I'm like an alcoholic who keeps walking past bars, and under their extremely helpful "More to Explore" categories, they suggested that since I had looked at The Crucible, I might also be interested in . . . Nixon in China! It's a small world.
A small, cruel world.
I have long suspected that the universe is designed to laugh at me, and I consider this convincing proof.
Ah, who knows, maybe when I see The Crucible I'll love it more than Nixon in China anyway. We'll see who laughs last. . . .
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