More fat

Some weeks back I commented -- maybe just a little brattily -- on the Fat Matter. Which provoked this, from a very fine professional in the vocal music world:

I actually agree with what you wrote about the "fat issue" though I don't think the Planet Debbie should have been bought out or let go from that production of Ariadne. The friggin' costume could have been modified. That's just fairness and non-discrimination. This was not a new production, after all. The whole thing was avoidable, and I think Covent Garden handled it shamefully--now they're taking a lot of heat for it. Meanwhile, Debbie waited a year and has made herself into a national heroine just at the moment she's releasing a new CD. Such is our world. "Hairspray" comes to opera.....Once again, the core issue gets ignored: Debbie is a dull singer with a good voice but no sense of phrase shape or musical arc. (I actually walked out--no, staggered out of her Ariadne performance because it made so little musical sense to me that I thought I was losing my mind.)  I don't care so much if she looks like "The Moon and I" but I have never been able to stand the way she (doesn't) make music. The first time I heard her she lumbered through "Ocean, thou mighty monster." It was what [critic's name suppressed] would have called, as he always does, "glorious"--i.e., loud, secure, and unvaried. After 90 seconds, I muttered, "Oh shit, this is going to take forever." Ocean in question seemed to be the Dead Sea.

Give this man a blog!

\And I have to say that I agree. I've never found her a compelling singer.