However bad this country may be, economicly or politicily (well everyone seems to be complaining all the time), there is defenitely one good thing about it ; and that is the way organise cultural activities/concerts for free.
And not just any concert. This time the City of Buenos Aires had invited the Spanish tenor Placido Domingo to sing. The Placido Domingo. For everyone.
As he is a great and very popular singer, they organised it in the best posible place of Capital, which is on the 9 de Julio, next to the obelisk. That one has to make a few sacrafices for that is evident. More then a week beforehand they start putting up the stage causing traffic problems… And then they just block the busiest road of the city. This must only be posible in Argentina.
You could get free tickets, but of course I was too late for that, I was told that they were “sold out” in no time. But as it was an ‘open air’ concert, I decided to go anyway. Convinced that there would be a place where we maybe wouldn’t see him, but at least hear him. He was supposed to sing on wednesday 23th of march, but it was posponed till thursday because of the rain.
And it wasn’t so bad : it was indeed crowded, but on several blocks they had put big screens and loudspeakers and about 120,000 people showed up to listen to this great singer, although there were only 22,000 seats. Many people took their own chair, and sat in groups drinking mate while enjoying the show.
Placido Domingo was accompanied by the magnificent Argentine soprano Virginia Tola who was able to give us the 1st goose bumps of the night, by 160 musicians (from the Teatro Argentino de La Plata, the orchestra of Colon, the National Symphony orchestra and the Buenos Aires philarmonic) and by the Choir of Colombus.
The show was perfectly organised, although the big screens fell out once in a while, and the acoustic wasn’t really good due to the many loudspeakers and the echo. But the whole show was grand. The city of Buenos Aires has scored some really good points here. It was an unforgettable night.
(I add a fragment of both Virginia Tola and Placido Domingo)
The Feel Good Way 
3 responses to “Placido Domingo”
mooi!!!
The city scored some points? The outdoor event was only because Domingo was NOT ALLOWED to perform in the theatre due to an on going strike that has crippled the cultural season.
The concert was not good at all because there was a strike for the musicians of the Colon Theater and they rushed to find anybody to play. The rest was a real shame for Domingo and Tola. The sound was bad, and they were lucky that people attending were for the most part not real fans of classical music. Otherwise there could had been a riot. Really shameful. An insult. Jorge Neguel, Tampa, Florida, USA.