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Cher Public

  • Buster: We get Edith Haller in L’Upupa soon, with John Mark Ainsley ...
  • La Valkyrietta: Of course that was Eileen Farrell singing for Eleanor Parker...
  • Indiana Loiterer III: I don't know whether she deserves another award, but no doub...
  • Quanto Painy Fakor: If course people who sing at the MET pay for private coachin...
  • La Valkyrietta: There does not seem to be her Ernani Involami in youtube. ...
  • kashania: Oh, I'm leaving for a week's vacation today. Sorry to miss ...
  • That Guy: "Heard" is an overstatement, at least based on the one perfo...
  • grimoaldo: I noticed a couple of comments expressing surprise that toni...
  • kashania: Does that mean that Fleming will be semi-fake-acting?
  • grimoaldo: Siegfried will be Jay Hunter Morris who replaced the replace...

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The boy friend

didonato_boxParterre fave Joyce DiDonato headlines an all-star performance of Le nozze di Figaro broadcast this afternoon from Lyric Opera of Chicago. [WFMTRead more »

Kukla, Fran and Regie

regie_02_21_04La Cieca is going to claim doyennical privilege here and say that the correct answers for last week’s Regie quiz are disqualified on grounds of a) silly guess and b) prior knowledge. Otherwise how could she go on with these Regie quizzes, knowing that such wildly unlikely images would immediately shout “Die Meistersinger” to you?  Anyway, more “unlikely images” after the jump.  Read more »

Winter meeting

boheme_metThis afternoon’s broadcast of La bohème (beginning at 1:00 pm) is sure to provoke lots of commentary from the parterriani.

Conductor: Marco Armiliato; Mimì: Anna Netrebko; Musetta: Nicole Cabell; Rodolfo: Piotr Beczala; Marcello: Gerald Finley; Schaunard: Massimo Cavalletti; Colline: Oren Gradus; Benoit/Alcindoro: Paul Plishka.

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Friday afternoon news dump, Rossini edition

No press release yet, but a couple of cher pubes have written to La Cieca noting that the name of Bruce Ford has disappeared from cast listings of the Met’s Armida, replaced by John Osborn.

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Come Meoni al brando

This just in from the Met press office: “Giovanni Meoni will sing the role of Ezio in Verdi’s Attila on February 27, March 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, and 19, replacing Carlos Alvarez, who is ill.” (Photo: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera) UPDATED: Note the correction above, i.e., Meoni is currently announced only for the performances to be conducted by Riccardo Muti; “TBA” is on for the three evenings to be conducted by Fabio Marco Armiliato. (That will change soon enough, sadly.)

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Snow day

What better way to stay warm (and to avoid falling branches) than to enjoy Our Own JJ in a rare symposium appearance? The bloviation transpires this afternoon, and details are after the jump.

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Here is style. Here is skill. Here is forethought.

That Issac Mizrahi production of A Little Night Music for Opera Theater of St. Louis just got even gay gay gay gay gayer with the announcement of legendary diva Siân Phillips in the role of Madame Armfeldt. Also appearing will be notable non-slouches Amy Irving as Desiree and Ron Raines as Fredrik. [OTSL]

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Regie is in the eye of the beholder

I really haven’t paid much attention to “opera regie,” so I can’t give you a firm definition of it. A while ago, a pithy and biting piece called “How to Opera Germanly” made the internet rounds, and it serves as a handy guide for we who are un- or under-initiated. This production of Haydn’s Orlando Paladino, recorded for TV (on DVD, EuroArts 2057788) at the Staatsoper Unter der Linden, Berlin in May of 2009, lacks certain de rigueur regie elements: no one is lit from beneath while wearing pale makeup with dark shading, there are no inexplicably homo-erotic moments, no [...]

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