A Culture Monster event with Placido Domingo and Gustavo Dudamel

Plácido Domingo and Gustavo Dudamel spend much of their time traveling the globe as the world’s best-known opera star and young conductor.

For one evening in Los Angeles, the men, in their first-ever joint appearance, will sit down for a conversation hosted by Los Angeles Times music critic Mark Swed. The public is invited to this free event, and Culture Monster readers will have the first opportunity to reserve seats.

Domingo and Dudamel spend a significant part of their professional lives in Los Angeles, and over the next month both are performing at the Music Center. Domingo, the general director of Los Angeles Opera, is singing in “Il Postino” and conducting “The Marriage of Figaro” at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Dudamel, the music director of the LA Phil, is opening his second season with the orchestra in eight October concerts at Walt Disney Concert Hall and returns for more in the winter and spring.

We will have them together for a Los Angeles Times Roundtable at 6 p.m. on Oct. 10 in the Grand Hall of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion at the Music Center in downtown Los Angeles. The evening is in partnership with the Music Center, the LA Phil and the LA Opera. Tickets are free, but you must RSVP. Click here for more information and to reserve your seats.

Culture Monster will be videotaping the conversation and replaying the highlights. We welcome questions from our readers, so please add yours to the comments section below or on the Culture Monster Facebook page.  Swed will select some to ask during the roundtable.

-- Sherry Stern

Comments

[Nelly Barendregt]

What a great idea that double conversation, and I would very much participate in it by congratulate Mr.Domingo and the LA Opera with the succes of "Il Postino", and I would ask him if he has - after Mantua - any plans for staged performances as Rigoletto.

With best wishes from Holland

Nelly Barendregt

[Dave Billnitzer]

To Mr. Domingo: I applaud LAO's commitment to bring new works to the local community, but at the same time, why not also some lesser-known American operas that might not be "new" but even so, have not been seen in LA? I am thinking "Dead Man Walking" or "Streetcar Named Desire" or going back a few years, Robert Ward's "The Crucible?" And Mr. Domingo, I think you would make a terrific Judge Danforth or Reverend Parris in that last opera - and besides, how often do you get to play the villain?

[Warren Bornholz]

Mr. Domingo - I saw Il Postino on opening night and it was very good, but I do have one question. Shouldn't the part of Pablo Neruda have been written for and been sung by a baritone? You are an historic tenor and one of my all time favorites (along with Bjorling and Martinelli) but as good as Il Postino was, I missed the tension that the baritone voice brings to the play and the music.

Can and should the Neruda role be rewritten for future productions, for a baritone, especially since there is no "major" part for a baritone in the entire opera?

[Michael]

For Gustavo and Placido: It is no secret that the majority of the Los Angeles Spanish-speaking community cannot afford tickets to LA Phil and LA Opera performances that average $100 or more. What steps do you think should be taken to make performances more accessible to our Spanish-speaking community?

[Tom Shima]

Both the orchestra and opera seem to be able to produce and fund compelling new experimental works, and in so doing, they have managed to increase the interest and perhaps also the size of its younger audience while maintaining its core audience. Do Mr Domingo and Mr Dudamel, have any advice for Michael Ritchie of the CTG, on how to get contemporary experimental works staged and funded?

Tom Shima

[SUZANNE KAUFMAN]

Mr. Domingo.

Do you know that our "esteemed" Mark Swed completely
ignored Charles Castronovo' in his review of Il Postino.
Not one word about his performance.

I heard it on KUSC and was impressed by the singing-
yours of course - but also Castronovo.

Don't you think he deserved recognition?

What a shame.

[Alberto Gonzalez]

Gustavo,
Unos de mis suenos es escuchar una interpretacion de Huapango de Moncayo en vivo...Se que usted hizo una hermosa version con la sinfonica juvenil de venezuela...la mejor que eh escuchado al dia....Tienes pensado hacerlo aqui en los angeles? Se que es una pieza muy complicada pero sera algo con no me perderia....

[Valley Mom]

Are there days that even you don't want to practice? How can a parent inspire a little musician without reducing both of us to tears?

-First question is from a 9 year old attending the roundtable. Second question is from her mother

[Louise Ghandhi]

Maestro Dudamel,

Un sueno de los ninos de Longfellow Elementary:
The children from the VYMA Music Project at Longfellow Elementary, an El Sistema inspired program now in its second year, have two wishes:
1. that you come and visit and
2. that, in the El Sistema spirit, the Longfellow children orchestra and choir perform with other children of similar programs such as the Expo Center and the HOLA programs.

Can you and Placido Domingo help in making those 2 wishes come true?

Muchas gracias!

[María Muñoz]

Maestro Domingo, we are looking forward in Spain to see Il Postino...are you going to sing it here in the future???? It looks marvelous, and sung in Spanish!
By the way, congratulations for the tango.....dancer too!!!
greetings and kisses from your country!

[Miguel kareh]

Me enorgullece leer de tus exitos all around the wolrd. Eres un ejemplo para la juventud Venezolana y tambien del mundo entero. Por cierto cual es el relleno de arepa que mas te gusta?

[Gayle Carmello]

Hola Placido y Gustavo,
Please tell us that this won't be the only dual appearance that you two have planned. I am already looking forward to a night of all Spanish music; including orchestral, vocal, choral, and of course mariachi and dance. What a fantastic celebration that would be. Placido, your concert in Las Vegas in Sept of 2008 is a great example of what you and Gustavo could do in Los Angeles. Might even be worth a tamale or two.
Warm Regards From Montana,
Gayle

[M.Avelar]

Mr. Dudamel; one of my favorite videos on youtube is when you conducted- Arturo Márquez' - Danzón Nº 2 with the Simon Bolivar Orchestra at the Proms Festival. I need to hear Danzon every day to complete my day! Congratulations!
Now my dream is to hear it in person. But at the prices for this Thursday's concert it is not possible. How do you feel about this composition and do you know Arturo Marquez personally?

[JERRY KRAIM]

Maestro Domingo. Congratulations on the successful premier of Il Postino. My wife & I totally enjoyed the performance. My question deals with another opera very familiar to you. The opera "La Juive" by Halevy demands mature tenor voice. Are there plans to stage it by LA Opera with you as Eleazar? That would be a super treat!!!

[Humberto Capiro]

QUESTIONS FOR MAESTRO DOMINGO AND MAESTRO DUDAMEL!

Maestro Domingo- Several years ago you brought a production of the spanish zarzuela "Luisa Fernanda" and it was a HUGE HIT! Now with the spanish language opera "Il Postino" we have another HUGE HIT! Do you think that Los Angeles Opera is ready for another zarzuela and another spanish language opera? Maybe from Latin America this time?

Maestro Dudamel- We have seen how you have brought the idea of "El Sistema" to Los Angeles and to the world, something that is very much needed. Are there programs of "El Sistema" that you want see implemented in Los Angeles that are not yet realized here? Can you tell us more?

[Vanessa Garcia]

To both Maestro Domingo and Maestro Dudamel,

In both of you we have "THE DREAM TEAM" of Classical Music! Will we see soon a collaboration between the two of you and maybe more spanish-speaking artists?

[Bruce Anderson]

@ Mr. Domingo: do you practice every day? How do you approach singing when you start for the first time each day? Do you have special exercises that you do daily? are they different on performance days? What do you do after singing a big performance in regards to your voice and vocal health?

@Mr. Dudamel: where do you find inspiration? Do you get ideas from other areas, for example: poetry, painting, nature, traffic, airplanes? Do you think classical musicians ever earn too much? The superstars like you get paid a great deal, but many very fine, working musicians struggle. How can we even out the revenue so that a musician's life is attainable for all talented, well-educated musicians? Likewise can orchestra management be paid too much?

[Frederic E. Bloomquist]

The Los Angeles Times is highly critical of President Hugo Chavez yet it was he who increased funding for the music program, El Sistema, that you participated in. How influential was that program on your development as a musician and conductor?

[EILEEN]

FOR GUSTAVO DUDAMEL
DO YOU FEEL PERSONALLY CONECTED WITH SCHUMANN'S 4TH SYMPHONY?
YOU SEEMED TO PUT EVERY PART OF YOUR BEING INTO CONDUCTING THIS EXTRAORDINARY PIECE OF MUSIC.