Man of La Mancha

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Music reviews of Man of La Mancha

Music Review: Extremely disappointing, saved only by Migenes.
Rating: 3 Stars

I assumed that this recording would be musically complete, taking full advantage of the CD format. However, I was wrong. Out of a compact disc that should be able to hold up to 80 minutes worth of music, roughly 50 minutes are taken advantage of only. Among the deletions: the male chorus's mocking reprises of "Dulcinea" after Quixote's exit; the tag "We're Only Thinking of Him," sung with Antonia's fiancee, the Doctor; the important, dramatic reprises of "The Impossible Dream" and "I, Don Quixote;" and the instrumental music for "The Abduction," "The Combat," and the entire "Knight of the Mirrors" scene are all missing. There is also a curious amount of dialogue for an album that cast so many non-acting opera singers and that has such a surprising lack of important musical number.

The performances . . .

Mandy Patinkin is SO ANNOYING! It's like his intention is to be irritating. What is the point of this? He totally misses Sancho Panza's touching, human side. Sancho is a human character, devoted to the confused, befuddled Quijanna, because (as he himself says) he "really likes him." Patinkin completely misses the mark with his obnoxious "characterizations" of Sancho. And he gets so wrapped-up in his own "interpretation" of the role, that he won't let enough of the material speak for itself, and the humor in the role (particularly in "A Little Gossip") suffers because of this. Since there was so much "carry-over" casting from Sony's KISMET album, why not give Sancho to Dom DeLuise (KISMET's Wazir). Of course, it might have been to high for him, but he would have been funny and touching, and ANYTHING would have been better than that dreadful Patinkin. I was little confused by the casting of Domingo as Quixote, because he is a tenor, and it is a baritone role after all. But he is a very dark tenor, and began his career as a baritone I believe. He sings the role beautifully and expressively--however, I still *long* for Richard Kiley in the role. A man who was a great actor and had a wonderful theatre voice, and who was a powerful presence in the role (while still capturing Quixote's weakness and "gentle insanities"). And Domingo is SO over-dramatic in his much of his performance! His few dialogue bits with Patinkin make one want to run and hide, and always leave me rolling my eyes. The best part of this album is Julia Migenes as Aldonza/Dulcinea. Perfect is the only word to describe her. She sings "What Does He Want of Me?" touchingly and simply. Her "It's All the Same" is performed with such tired frustration that is perfect for it, it's as if she's saying "this is who I am, and it's like this every day--nothing new." If it was not for her presence in her dialogue tracks with Domingo and Patinkin, those tracks would be skipped. And her rendition of the dramatic song "Aldonza" is beyond describing. It is disturbingly brilliant. That track alone makes this poorly-executed fiasco worth purchasing. If one feels they have to purchase this, buy it for her alone. Hadely and Ramey give wonderful vocal performances (as always), but they are unfortunately heard too briefly on the album. Hadely's "To Each His Dulcinea" is beautiful, and this characterization of the Padre is surprisingly touching. Ramey leads "Knight of the Woeful Countenance" with power and force, "oomph!" as it were. And Domingo's sons sing "Little Bird, Little Bird" quite nicely.

Gemignani leads the American Theatre Orchestra powerfully through the score, and the Concert Chorale of New York always sing with gusto.

When all is said and done, one would think that this recording was only made because there were a lot of contracts sitting around in the Sony offices gathering dust, and they asked Shepard to take advantage of it quickly. The two performances that I had made assumptions of before I bought this album turned out to be true (Migenes and Patinkin), but the rest of the album was not what I imagined at all.

AVOID!!! (But try at least to hear Migenes's rendition of "Aldonza.")

Description of Man of La Mancha

Broadway & Vocalists CDs

• Music > Styles
• Classical
• Pop