How shall I respond to this?

Me: The artist is Alison Balsam. The music is Mozart. The opera is the Magic Flute. The character is the Queen of the Night. The instrument is the trumpet. (no problems yet). The mood being conveyed by the instrument at hand: SERENITY AND BEAUTY!!!!! Yes, the high notes were hit, but it almost seems like this instrumentalist was saying "Look how pretty I can play this!" That particular aria was not meant to be pretty! The Queen of the Night, rather pissed off at this point, sings with furor in her voice.





Person: Perhaps part of the intention and appeal for the whole aria is the juxtaposition between the libretto and the music. Given that the libretto is not present in this recording, nor is there any staging, the bitterness that's present in the libretto has no vehicle for transmission to the audience.


Without the libretto, a musician is left with a beautiful and virtuosic melody. Alison Balsom is a ridiculous trumpeter and amazingly hot (for anyone who cares).

How shall I respond to this?
I, for one, for the most part, usually detest transcriptions of any kind. The one you reference, I wouldn't even care to listen too: sounds horrendous.





I guess that I'm just too much of a "purist": rarely is any transcription in any way justified, and even more rarely, successful.





I can think of only a few, such as the following: Ravel's orchestration of Moussorgsky's "Pictures At An Exhibition", and Korsakov's "Night On Bare Mountain" by the same composer.





Alberich
Reply:I think a musician can play a piece of music any way she wants. If we do not like her interpretation of it then so be it.





She may even play it differently at each performance.