19 October 2005
Beeld Plus

Veenemans impressive in her vocal “Flair”

Soprano “Flair”
Musaion, Pretoria
Thys Odendaal

Art, and especially opera singing, is like cricket. You can practise for hours in the nets but the real test lies on the pitch in front of a crowd. A singer can warm the voice, but on stage, you stand on your own. Traps are everywhere, despite the hard work beforehand. The difference is that the sportsman cannot choose his own programme, but the singer can. 

Michelle Veenemans’s choice to sing the Olympia aria from Offenbach’s Les contes d’Hoffmann is on spot – she sings it excellently – but this is not an aria to open an opera concert. It is too technical. 

It is probably successful in one concert, but not for another. It is however important that the first aria does make an impression. 

If she had sung the Les oiseaux dans la charmille later in the “Flair” programme, then the sudden soundless breath on the note would not have happened. 

The dramatised renditions of the arias were excellently done. The very good impression she made earlier in Johannesburg confirmed her vocalisation in the more advantageous Musaion. Aside from her long legato phrases, her coloratura work was colourful and well prepared. She is both suited as Adele and Rosalinda in Fledermaus, with a provocative Czardas, characteristic of her overall performance … 

One cannot imagine why Veenemans has never been heard in a full performance. (In our dreadful opera industry, not at all a surprise).

(Newspaper review: Translation from Afrikaans to English)