Those La Boheme Nights

Puccini has a way of getting under your skin, and invading your dreams. For the past few nights I have bolted wide awake with Act I of La Boheme going through my head. When singing Puccini one must count and listen like mad in order to hear a que and sing at the exact moment. This is not symmetrical form music like my beloved Mozart composed. Alas, Puccini liked to write rather unsymmetrical ensemble dialogue and arias in which he fancied lietmotifs and mood enticing scoring. in Act I of La Boheme Puccini introduces the four main guy characters, Marcello, Rudolpho, Colline, and Shaunard, all who are poor starving artists of some variety. The complain of the bitter cold and starvation until Shaunard enters with some money & food earned from a British Lord. The sound que's are tight and sometimes sycopated, or off-beat. Repitition, I find, is the best rehearsal regime. And thus, with so much repitition the subconscious just loves to take the opportunity during REM sleep to repeat those queues just one (or ten) more times. Yes, for the past week I have suffered an acute case of PPSD (Puccini Production Stress Disorder) and insomnia is my enemy. Almost to the minute I will wake up at 3:30 am with the lines of Puccini rolling past the scrollboard of my mind. When will it end? Hopefully soon 'cause we gotta get to learning how to deliver improvised opera next!