Jungfer Marianne Leitmetzerin
I am happy to finally add Les contes d’Hoffmann to the playlist in a Salzburg performance from 2003 with Neil Shicoff in one of his parade roles.
It will be no surprise that your alte Jungfer (pictured) is particularly fond of the music of Richard Strauss.
“What fools these mortals be!”
There has been a conspicuous absence of chat on Parterre about this year’s Bayreuther Festspiele.
Puccini’s Il trittico was most definitely not an overwhelming success when it received its December 1918 world premiere at the Met.
Shirley Verrett remains one of my all-time favorite artists, and I am pleased to introduce her to my Mixcloud site in one of her parade roles: the femme fatale in Saint-Saëns’ Samson et Dalila.
Subtitled by its creators as “A Fearful Radio Show,” this opera reminded Jerome Robbins of Orson Welles’ 1938 broadcast of War of the Worlds.
The cast of Wiener Staatsoper’s first-ever performance of Lulu in 1968 reads like a Who’s Who of then-contemporary Austro-German opera: the 28-year-old Anja Silja, Martha Mödl, Waldemar Kmentt, Hans Hotter, Hilde Konetzni, Manfred Jungwirth, Heinz Zednik, and Karl Böhm presiding over a production by Otto Schenk.
It’s time to add more legends to my Mixcloud site: Mario Del Monaco, Raina Kabaivanska, and Tito Gobbi star in this 1962 performance of Otello from Covent Garden led by Georg Solti.
Berlioz apparently couldn’t decide if his was an oratorio or an opera, so he labeled it a “légende dramatique.” Since its 1846 Paris premiere, it remains on both opera stages and in concert halls, with its first Met staging in 1906.
This week, I offer you a classic rendition of Richard Strauss’ tale of the House of Atreus starring Ursula Schröder-Feinen, Astrid Varnay, Leonie Rysanek, Theo Adam, and Hans Hopf under Karl Böhm’s direction.
When Neil Shicoff celebrated the 40th anniversary of his 1975 stage debut as Ernani in Cincinnati, no one had any idea that it would, essentially, mark the end of his career. In 2014 he added the roles of Canio (at Wiener Staatsoper) and Calaf (at Volksoper Wien) to his repertoire to great acclaim.
Philip Glass is indisputably one of the most prolific composers of the last half century, yet none of his more than 20 operas has found a place in the standard repertoire.
Too often I allow my memories of great singers to be dulled by late career behavior, delving into unsuitable roles or just plain laziness.
Perhaps the most admirable project of Dominique Meyer’s Intendanz at Wiener Staatsoper is the traversal of the operas of Leos Janancek,.
Francis Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites essentially had three world premieres in 1957: first at La Scala (sung in Italian), then Paris (sung in French), followed by San Francisco (sung in English).
Which diva gets to sing “I hope you die! I hope you die soon! I’ll be waiting for you to die!”
Can it all be true? She did what? He said what?
Where were you in 1975?
Simon, Simon, Simon: how we do love you (and miss you)!
The focus in this 1974 performance of Salome from Orange is (mostly) on the Herodes of Jon Vickers.
It’s time for celebrations!
Here’s our beloved Juan Diego Flórez last week, continuing his voyage into heavier repertoire as the titular love-sick teenager in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette.
We have a major discovery (well, to me at least) of a spectacular talent: American tenor Michael Spyres.
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.
