2014 European Chamber Music School: Blog 2
Our finest musicians from the University of Sydney’s Conservatorium of Music are in Italy for the first European Chamber Music Summer School. They are staging daily concerts in Verona, Mantova and Venice at prestigious venues like The Bibiena Theatre, Palazzo Te and La Pieta. Our students report from Italy. This week has far exceeded my already high expectations. Working with Lella Cuberli has been brilliant. We spend about six wonderfully intense hours a day with Lella, rotating through technique and repertoire sessions. Working with her is informative, interesting and, most of all, motivating. However, I feel observing lessons is most valuable. Lella has such a wealth of knowledge, and the little pieces of singing gold she hands to us are invaluable. We all appreciate how generous she is with her time. As mentioned in the last post, we were all very excited to step inside the ancient Arena di Verona to be spectators of Verdi’s Aida. To claim the prime stone seating, it was recommended that we arrive at least two hours earlier than the start time of 9pm. Can you believe the opera was scheduled to finish at 1:30am?! After a day of threatening thunderstorms, we had our umbrellas packed and our…