Christopher Corwin
Christopher Corwin began writing for parterre box in 2011 under the pen name “DeCaffarrelli.” His work has also appeared in , The New York Times, Musical America, The Observer, San Francisco Classical Voice and BAMNotes. Like many, he came to opera via the Saturday Met Opera broadcasts which he began listening to at age 11. His particular enthusiasm is 17th and 18th century opera. Since 2015 he has curated the weekly podcast Trove Thursday on parterre box presenting live recordings.
The most disappointing performance in 30 otherwise glorious years of William Christie and Les Arts Florissants visiting New York City.
Sondra Radvanovsky returned for her 29th Met Aïda Thursday night (but only her second Aïda.)
Although Gustav Mahler never wrote an opera, his colossal Eighth Symphony “The Symphony of a Thousand” may give us some glimpses of what a Mahler opera might have sounded like
Since 1985, from the Chicago Symphony at Carnegie Hall to the Welsh National Opera visiting BAM and from Chicago Lyric to New York City Opera to the Met, I’ve never encountered a bad Falstaff—or one that didn’t astound and delight me.
“Trove Thursday” this week features the earliest of the fat-knight operas: Antonio Salieri’s 1799 Falstaff.
A double-barreled “Trove Thursday” birthday salute to Renée Fleming who turns 60 today.
Handel’s Radamisto returned to New York when Opera Lafayette movingly performed this early masterpiece.
“Trove Thursday” offers a broadcast of the French baroque tragédie en musique Alcyone by Marin Marais.
A beautiful concert of 18th century sacred music arrived at Weill Recital Hall performed by the soulful Polish Wunderkind Jakub Jósef Orlinski.
I was shocked to realize I hadn’t seen Don Giovanni at the Met since Michael Grandage’s stultifying production opened in 2011.
For the conclusion of its tribute to the late Montserrat Caballé, “Trove Thursday” offers Dvorak’s Armida.
Iolanta was crowned on Thursday evening by Sonya Yoncheva’s haunting portrayal of the blind title character.
A 1985 broadcast of Don Giovanni featuring Cheryl Studer, Gundula Janowitz (as Elvira!), Krisztina Laki, Gösta Winbergh, Hermann Prey (in a rare outing as the Don) and Malcolm King conducted by Jeffrey Tate.
Although she didn’t sing that eponymous song by Reynaldo Hahn at Weill Recital Hall Thursday evening, Sabine Devieilhe did offer an “exquisite hour” of early 20th century French songs.
If I had to live with just one Tchaikovsky opera, it would be Iolanta.
When a work is named for its lovers one might legitimately expect that pair to dominate its performance but in my experience that is never the case with Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande.
“Trove Thursday” offers a recent broadcast of one of his best-known but rarely performed operas, Il Mitridate Eupatore.
Though barely a week old, 2019 has already provided New Yorkers with an essential, breathtaking music drama focusing on two women struggling for their very survival.
Claude Debussy wrote a number of large-scale vocal/choral pieces two of which are featured today on “Trove Thursday”: La Damoiselle élue and Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien.
Use bodily force and get your friends to one of the next five performances of the Met’s new production of Adriana Lecouvreur. It is everything!
We close 2018 with Le Comte Ory with an enviable nearly all-Italian cast of prime-time Rossini specialists: Mariella Devia, Cecila Bartoli, Ewa Podles, William Matteuzzi, Claudio Desderi and Pietro Spagnoli.
Heretofore I’d avoided the Met’s abridged, English-language holiday presentations.
Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel in an unusual broadcast conducted by Herbert von Karajan featuring Sena Jurinac and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf as the mischievous pair—performing in Italian!
French early music group Ensemble Correspondances offered two of the year’s very best concerts.
Tell us: What was the best of 2025?
Parterre Box concludes the thrilling first year of Talk of the Town by inviting your lightning rod opinions on several more categories of operatic argumentation.
