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Today -- well, technically yesterday -- the Madrid Cast! Yes, I listened to it yesterday but then got sidetracked and never typed up my notes into a proper post.
HERE ARE MY THOUGHTS.
It was different listening to this than the Japanese version, because in Japanese the only bits I could recognize were the names and the occasional preserved English word. In Spanish, well, I don't speak Spanish but I have just enough vague knowledge of the Romance languages via my compulsory Canadian French education and via English's half-Romance background that I can pick out wee bits and pieces. So where in the Japanese I could ignore the words to focus on the voices and the emotions and all that stuff, in this one I kept on being distracted by the feeling like there is sense hiding in the words and I could grasp it if I only paid more attention, but of course I can't because unlike my sister I do not know Spanish. It'll be even worse listening to the French casts, because I'll constantly be like "I RECOGNIZE THAT WORD BUT FORGET WHAT IT MEANS" and stuff. Sighhhh.
The Madrid Cast Valjean continues the tradition of being good in all versions. Javert, though, I'm not a big fan. I just wasn't feeling him. I was pretty impressed with Fantine, as Fantines who are not Anne Hathaway go. bb!Cosette sounded too old for the role. Eponine is pretty good. For Marius and Cosette, I'm starting to feel like I've lost any ability to judge my opinion of them, through having listened to too many versions without as much range of interpretation between them as there is for other characters.
And I didn't note down any opinions for any of the other characters. Many of the more minor characters I didn't have any strong opinion on, and some I just couldn't pick out. Enjolras, for example, was very hard for me to locate, because I've discovered it's a lot harder to follow a foreign-language Les Mis when it's such a highlights version -- it's only one cd's worth of music, not two or three like many others. So it jumped from place to place without giving me the cues I need to figure out which Ami was Enjolras.
Something I did note down, though, was something I've been meaning to mention for a while and kept forgetting to talk about, which is that I have an unfortunate inherent bias against sopranos. I'm just not as into higher voices! I think they're great as counterpoint to other stuff, as part of a beautiful harmony, but when listening to a soprano alone I am just...not a fan. Which means Cosette as the musical portrays her has an extra thing to overcome to get me to like her. I AM SORRY COSETTE! You are part of a love triangle and you are a soprano and the musical doesn't give you anything to do but be an object of love, and so I JUST CAN'T CARE ABOUT YOU LIKE I WANT TO. (I'm not hugely into the musical's Eponine either, because of aforementioned boring love triangle, but she at least is an alto so I enjoy her more. IT'S AMAZING HOW VOICE PART INFLUENCES HOW YOU THINK OF SOMEONE! Which I think is why basically all female romantic leads in musicals are all sopranos, because most people who are not me find it appealing in a lady. Or something.)
(I remember reading once, actually, an interesting meta post about traditional voice parts of dude villains versus dude heroes and how Jesus is like The Only Exception to the rule that The Hero Is A Tenor. It was really interesting! Here's the post: Heroism and the Tenor Anyways this is wayyyyy off topic. I LIKE MY PARENTHETICAL ASIDES THOUGH.)
GOING BACK TO LES MIS, I've discovered that the downside of listening to foreign casts for Les Mis is that I get little snippets of the language-I-don't-speak lyrics stuck in my head, only since I don't speak the language, I'm quite sure I'm mentally mangling the lyrics into some sort of awful stereotype of the language and then I feel bad. On the other hand, I've been intrigued to discover that even while I am busy listening to a different cast every day, which results in me having Les Mis stuck in my head ALL THE TIME, it's always in my head the CSR version. Always. No matter what version I was most recently listening to.
So today I decided to relisten to the CSR instead of moving on to the OFC, and it was actually kind of a weird experience. It felt so much more real to me than any of the other versions I've been listening to, no matter how good those other versions are. It's like, in my head THESE ARE THE CHARACTERS and everyone else is just playacting. Playacting very well, and in some cases doing a better job than the people on the CSR, but the CSR people are still THE REAL THEM in my head and I can't convince my subconscious otherwise.
ALSO ALSO, moving on from the musical, I appear to be stalled out in the book. Not because I'm not enjoying it, but because I have TOO MANY FEELS. THE REVOLUTION IS STARTING, aka the beginning of the inevitable deaths of everyone, and I just cannot handle it. HOPEFULLY I WILL SUCCESSFULLY TALK MYSELF INTO CONTINUING SOON, because I really really want to read more of it! I love the book! BUT CURRENTLY TOO MANY FEELS. :((((
(also also also I know I haven't responded to any comments in a while. I'LL GET BACK TO THAT. I just am determined to not let my comment!fail stop me from making posts the way it too often does.)
HERE ARE MY THOUGHTS.
It was different listening to this than the Japanese version, because in Japanese the only bits I could recognize were the names and the occasional preserved English word. In Spanish, well, I don't speak Spanish but I have just enough vague knowledge of the Romance languages via my compulsory Canadian French education and via English's half-Romance background that I can pick out wee bits and pieces. So where in the Japanese I could ignore the words to focus on the voices and the emotions and all that stuff, in this one I kept on being distracted by the feeling like there is sense hiding in the words and I could grasp it if I only paid more attention, but of course I can't because unlike my sister I do not know Spanish. It'll be even worse listening to the French casts, because I'll constantly be like "I RECOGNIZE THAT WORD BUT FORGET WHAT IT MEANS" and stuff. Sighhhh.
The Madrid Cast Valjean continues the tradition of being good in all versions. Javert, though, I'm not a big fan. I just wasn't feeling him. I was pretty impressed with Fantine, as Fantines who are not Anne Hathaway go. bb!Cosette sounded too old for the role. Eponine is pretty good. For Marius and Cosette, I'm starting to feel like I've lost any ability to judge my opinion of them, through having listened to too many versions without as much range of interpretation between them as there is for other characters.
And I didn't note down any opinions for any of the other characters. Many of the more minor characters I didn't have any strong opinion on, and some I just couldn't pick out. Enjolras, for example, was very hard for me to locate, because I've discovered it's a lot harder to follow a foreign-language Les Mis when it's such a highlights version -- it's only one cd's worth of music, not two or three like many others. So it jumped from place to place without giving me the cues I need to figure out which Ami was Enjolras.
Something I did note down, though, was something I've been meaning to mention for a while and kept forgetting to talk about, which is that I have an unfortunate inherent bias against sopranos. I'm just not as into higher voices! I think they're great as counterpoint to other stuff, as part of a beautiful harmony, but when listening to a soprano alone I am just...not a fan. Which means Cosette as the musical portrays her has an extra thing to overcome to get me to like her. I AM SORRY COSETTE! You are part of a love triangle and you are a soprano and the musical doesn't give you anything to do but be an object of love, and so I JUST CAN'T CARE ABOUT YOU LIKE I WANT TO. (I'm not hugely into the musical's Eponine either, because of aforementioned boring love triangle, but she at least is an alto so I enjoy her more. IT'S AMAZING HOW VOICE PART INFLUENCES HOW YOU THINK OF SOMEONE! Which I think is why basically all female romantic leads in musicals are all sopranos, because most people who are not me find it appealing in a lady. Or something.)
(I remember reading once, actually, an interesting meta post about traditional voice parts of dude villains versus dude heroes and how Jesus is like The Only Exception to the rule that The Hero Is A Tenor. It was really interesting! Here's the post: Heroism and the Tenor Anyways this is wayyyyy off topic. I LIKE MY PARENTHETICAL ASIDES THOUGH.)
GOING BACK TO LES MIS, I've discovered that the downside of listening to foreign casts for Les Mis is that I get little snippets of the language-I-don't-speak lyrics stuck in my head, only since I don't speak the language, I'm quite sure I'm mentally mangling the lyrics into some sort of awful stereotype of the language and then I feel bad. On the other hand, I've been intrigued to discover that even while I am busy listening to a different cast every day, which results in me having Les Mis stuck in my head ALL THE TIME, it's always in my head the CSR version. Always. No matter what version I was most recently listening to.
So today I decided to relisten to the CSR instead of moving on to the OFC, and it was actually kind of a weird experience. It felt so much more real to me than any of the other versions I've been listening to, no matter how good those other versions are. It's like, in my head THESE ARE THE CHARACTERS and everyone else is just playacting. Playacting very well, and in some cases doing a better job than the people on the CSR, but the CSR people are still THE REAL THEM in my head and I can't convince my subconscious otherwise.
ALSO ALSO, moving on from the musical, I appear to be stalled out in the book. Not because I'm not enjoying it, but because I have TOO MANY FEELS. THE REVOLUTION IS STARTING, aka the beginning of the inevitable deaths of everyone, and I just cannot handle it. HOPEFULLY I WILL SUCCESSFULLY TALK MYSELF INTO CONTINUING SOON, because I really really want to read more of it! I love the book! BUT CURRENTLY TOO MANY FEELS. :((((
(also also also I know I haven't responded to any comments in a while. I'LL GET BACK TO THAT. I just am determined to not let my comment!fail stop me from making posts the way it too often does.)
