16 April 2007

"Gorgeous is in. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a piano virtuosa or a diva darling – if you’ve got looks to match your dazzling chops, the music marketeers will have a field day. So be a babe! Take Angela Gheorghiu, for instance ... just try to identify her publicity photos as that of an opera singer. Wouldn’t the unwashed guess she’s a starlet? A model? Someone whose sole claim to fame is beauty?

Well, we have a virtual flood of candidates to fill the current glam standard. And do they. Anna Netrebko, who, months ago here, gave us an inimitable Manon that was on a par with Vivien Leigh’s Scarlett O’Hara, flashes about in her flamboyant videos and runway-style publicity events..." LA City Beat