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.
Due to bandwidth limits “Trove Thursday” must post some more modest offerings in months with five Thursdays.
You’d think by now I’d know better than to make snap judgments about an opera or a singer—but apparently not.
Can a surfeit of pleasure become—in the end—unsatisfying?
“Trove Thursday” offers Gemma di Vergy with the lovely, largely now forgotten Adriana Maliponte in the title role.
This week’s “Trove Thursday” offers Benjamin Britten’s Death in Venice featuring Anthony Rolfe Johnson.
Wednesday brought Christopher Alden’s grimly dark and violent take on Handel’s Aci, Galatea e Polifemo at National Sawdust.
The highlight of this year’s Bard Summerscape festival must be a rare staging of Dvorak’s Dimitrij.
Endlessly extricating her from existing contracts then negotiating new ones must make being Sonya Yoncheva’s manager the hardest job in the music business.
A week from Saturday Will Crutchfield’s “Bel Canto at Caramoor” ends a 20-year run with Il Pirata.
“Trove Thursday” provides a live broadcast of Mozart’s rarely performed cantata Davide Penitente by Les Arts Florissants conducted by William Christie.
LoftOpera’s accurately but unpromisingly named Pergolesi & Vivaldi stumbled rather than soared.
A live broadcast of the prologue to Ariadne auf Naxos featuring Julia Varady, a favorite sopranos in a role she sang only rarely.
A poster outside Carnegie Hall proclaimed “Mahler Well Met” and to some degree it proved to be true.
A complete live performance of Stephen Sondheim’s wildly eccentric Anyone Can Whistle featuring the divine Audra McDonald as Fay.
An outstanding performance of Weber’s Euryanthe to share on “Trove Thursday.”
A live Un Ballo in Maschera featuring Jon Vickers, Amy Shuard, Lucia Popp, Shirley Verrett and Peter Glossop.
At long last, cher public, a finale to our Senta’s Ballad quiz, nearly a month late! The name of the winner and the complete lists of sopranos after the jump.
The 2017 Glyndebourne Festival opens on Saturday with the UK premiere of L’Ipermestra conducted by William Christie and directed by Graham Vick.
“Trove Thursday” pays tribute to the great German bass Kurt Moll
Anticipation of events like the Metropolitan Opera’s 50th Anniversary bash turns me back into the newly opera-soused kid who begged his parents to let him watch the highlights of the Bing Gala on the family color television.
“Trove Thursday” presents a live Motezuma conducted by Alan Curtis with Karina Gauvin, Sonia Prina, Mary-Ellen Nesi, Vito Priante and Ann Hallenberg (as Hernán Cortés!).
I don’t usually attend a performance of an opera I’ve known well most of my life expecting a revelation.
Met audiences might have to wait a very long time for Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.
The wild tempest that whipped and drenched the audience as it exited the Met after Tuesday’s season premiere of Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer mirrored the finer features of the evening.
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.
