Garden leave
Brigitte Fassbaender’s acid-laced production of La finta giardiniera leans into the absurdities of Mozart’s early dramma giocoso.
Orsolya Gyárfás
Based in Budapest, Orsolya Gyárfás has been publishing opera reviews in English and Hungarian since 2016. Currently wrapping up a PhD focusing on Metastasian opera seria; general interests and obsessions include all things Baroque, queer, Regietheater, and any given combination of the above.
Holding out for a hero
Clémence de Grandval’s Mazeppa gets the superhero treatment in Dortmund.
She’s no basic britch
Samantha Hankey’s Composer is the standout in the Wiener Staatsoper’s episodically sublime Ariadne auf Naxos revival.
Gender? I hardly know her!
Christof Loy’s production of Pablo Luna’s gender-bending Orientalist farce Benamor proves to be irresistible.
Dad, I’m seria
Sir Simon Rattle and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra strike (almost) all the right notes in their new recording of Mozart’s Idomeneo.
Psyché’d up
It would be difficult to find a better description for Ambroise Thomas’s newly-recovered Psyché, recently heard in a new recording from Palazzetto Bru Zane, than the one uttered by her suitors: “Charmante Psyché!”
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
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).
