ReJoyce! Singers in the back row stopped texting.

Memorable experience last Sunday afternoon in Carnegie Hall: Alcina. A breathtaking performance of Handel's last (of dozens) opera by The English Concert conducted by Harry Bicket. (Do you remember? That's the same group who attracted an audience of ~200 in Elizabethtown when we had to paper the house a few years ago.) 

Sunday was one of the series Joyce DiDonato curated for this season in Carnegie. Joyce as Alcina and a small cast of others whose names you might not recognize (see Tony Tommasini's review) delivered some of the best singing I have ever heard. 

Alas, most human beings have the misfortune to live entire lives without hearing a Handel opera. 

Alex Ross wrote a wonderful profile of Joyce last year. 

She sang the National Anthem at the last World Series game. More Kansans were familiar with the singer from "Staind" who forgot the words (maybe it was his first waltz?) before game 5. 

Do Joyce and Staind represent the bipolar state of music in America?

Did I mention DiDonato's Juilliard commencement address?