"Idol" For Classical Music Fans

Last night while playing with my remote control I stumbled across Bathroom Divas.

There are several short videos from the show on You Tube, so here is one of them for those of you interested in checking it out.

Divas is a reality show in which aspiring opera singers go to an "opera boot camp" and then are judged on how much they have improved week to week. The prize is the chance to sing with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. So I can't call it the Classical American Idol because it is a Canadian production (although apparently by the American reality network Bravo which brings us Project Runway and Top Chef). It's on a network called Ovation, which I don't remember seeing before.

Bathroom Divas has the usual drawbacks of a reality show, although I thought the episode I saw had much less feigned drama than Top Chef and Project Runway. The remarks of the vocal coaches were fascinating to me as an avid amateur classical singer myself. I got interested in it because one of the young women in the competition chose to learn the incredibly difficult aria of the Queen of the Night from Mozart's Magic Flute. What a gutsy move! And she did a creditable job and moved on to the next round.

Playing around with the You Tube videos, I learned that the first season winner was the guy who was a country-western singer! Do you love it?

Classical music fans, check it out!