July 2008
Glimpsed (left to right) after the Sunday performance of “Viva la Diva”: dancer Ralph Coppola, eponymous diva Dorothy Bishop, audience member Jason Leggett, dancer Eric Thomas, Our Own JJ. “Viva la Diva” is held over for a final performance tonight at the Pillowfight Theatre Festival. Â
According to boston.com, James Levine will miss the remainder of the season at Tanglewood in order to have a kidney removed. The maestro will require about six weeks of recuperation after the surgery. The Tanglewood season will continue as planned, with guest conductors taking over Levine’s eight scheduled dates.
Glamazonian Grace Bumbry reveals her secret origin. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://youtube.com/v/9F-ewNUS6rU” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /] More Bumbry palaver and some staged excerpts of her greatest roles (but aren’t they all?) may be found on Coloraturafan2‘s YouTube site.
The Beautiful Voice is known for her improvisational skills both as an actress and as a musician (who can forget her “Over the Rainbow” or “O légère hirondelle?”) Now La Fleming has harnessed her spontaneity to create a variant text for her first public performance of a celebrated Puccini aria. Manon ho studiato UPDATE: The…
Our most recent Regiequiz was no match for the little grey cells of Monsieur RMP, who deduced right off that the opera in question was Il Turco in Italia. And now, let’s take a look at another opera, its identity perhaps obscured by modern costuming. Â
If you take a look at the comments sections of recent posts, you will note that a number of off-topic personal attacks (and responses to attacks, and responses to responses) have gone down the oubliette. La Cieca entreats her cher public to stay on-topic and to refrain from personal attacks because she really doesn’t want…
Finally, the closing acts of Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots are presented by your dilatory doyenne on Unnatural Acts of Opera. Les Huguenots Acts 4 and 5
It would be tempting to say that the Wagner dynasty has nothing on the Menotti family, except that it’s just not true. The generational intrigues of the descendants of the Meister (as detailed in Brigitte Haman’s Winifred Wagner: A Life at the Heart of Hitler’s Bayreuth), reflect the superhuman scale of Wagner’s musical vision. The…
Naked barihunk (a phrase that will eventually become tautological, La Cieca predicts) Daniel Okulitch stars in The Fly, the new opera by Howard Shore and David Henry Hwang opening tonight at the Théâtre du Châtelet.
According to a press release from the New York City Opera, George Manahan will continue there as Music Director through 2012. In the inaugural Gérard Mortier season beginning in the fall of 2009, Maestro Manahan will conduct performances of Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress and Britten’s Death in Venice. Manahan is booked as well for Szymanowski’s…
The cabaret show “Viva la Diva,” directed by Our Own JJ and starring Dorothy Bishop, has been booked for an additional performance this week as part of the Pillowfight Theatre Festival. The show goes on at 9:00 p.m. on July 3 at The Green Room at 45 Bleecker. Tickets are $25 at the door. Already…
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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