A favorite Verdi performance from Eli Jacobson
The immortal Renata Tebaldi, just about 29 years old as Saint Joan in a RAI broadcast of Giovanna d’Arco from 1951.
Eli Jacobson
Difficult people
Anna Pirozzi makes a welcome return to the Metropolitan Opera, but Turandot remains as thorny as ever.
More than a material girl
The vivacious MANON! at Heartbeat Opera makes a strong case for the return of opera in translation.
Swing and miss
The oddball pairing of Bernie Williams and Jonathan Tetelman doesn’t quite knock it out of the park at Carnegie Hall.
To be a poet is a condition
Are today’s stars enough to sustain Andrea Chénier?
The replacements
Second casts in Don Giovanni and Turandot at the Metropolitan Opera offer mixed blessings.
Ain’t no mountain high enough
A new production of La sonnambula at the Metropolitan Opera is musically charming if dramatically confounding.
He plays the violin
This Bard production, led by Leon Botstein, makes the strongest possible case musically, dramatically and visually for Smetana’s opera Dalibor.
Sleepwalkers awake
La sonnambula at Teatro Nuovo overcomes uneven casting to highlight the many charms of Bellini’s bel canto masterpiece
You can go your own way
Eli Jacobson on a luscious evening of early Strauss with Guntram at Carnegie Hall
Many happy returns
The Met’s mostly successful revivals of The Queen of Spades and La bohème showcase the returns of Sonya Yoncheva and Corinne Winters
Povera Butterfly
A parade of young singers delight in an intimate Madama Butterfly at Amore Opera
Wishin’ and hopin’ and thinkin’ and prayin’
Eli Jacobson inaugurates parterre box’s new “Perspectives on the Aria” feature with a deep dive into Leonore’s “Abscheulicher!” from Beethoven’s Fidelio which returns to the Metropolitan Opera tomorrow with the Met’s current dramatic soprano star Lise Davidsen as Leonore.
Aged in oak
When the birthdays start to pile up in the double digits in big round numbers, you start to examine your past and review what you have done with your life.
Pirate lives
The New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players are celebrating their 50th Anniversary Season presenting Ruddigore (last month), The Pirates of Penzance (first two weekends in January), and Iolanthe (on its way in April).
The government shall be upon his shoulders
Despite not being very happy with the state of the world (and the union) and not looking forward to the New Year, this past December I took in many festive holiday offerings including a pair of oratorios.
Tucker and roll
The Richard Tucker Foundation Gala has always been a big annual celebration of the voice with an emphasis on big-voiced singers in big repertoire (not much Wagner usually, though…). Like so many reliable operatic institutions it has struggled for survival after the pandemic.
Castanet diva
Lisette Oropesa, a product of the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Program, has not been seen much on the stage of the Met in recent seasons.
Nice piece of Tales
Les Contes d’Hoffmann is something of a puzzle in which some of the pieces are missing and others been altered to fit since Offenbach died before he could complete and revise the work.
What ever happened to her?
When the subject of New York City Opera comes up, you always hear the same query: “What happened to City Opera? Are they even performing these days??”
Pansexual relations
Love makes fools of us all – that seems to be the theme of this summer’s Glimmerglass Festival.
Come, young waverers
Too young to be in love. But not too young to go to war or to die.
A happening in Central Park
The outdoor recitals that the Metropolitan Opera presents in New York City Parks every summer are a wonderful way to showcase rising young stars and promising beginners from the Met’s Lindemann Program.
It may not have been echt, but it was fun!
On June 11th, the Met Orchestra returned to Carnegie Hall with a diverse program led by music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).