Parterre Box
John Adams‘s newest opera in a live broadcast from New York
Tristan transcriptions for violin, piano, and orchestra.
George Benjamin‘s opera live from the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome
A live broadcast from New York
Antony and Cleopatra is perhaps not the showcase Elizabeth DeShong deserves, so Grand Tier Grab Bag highlights the superlative mezzo in two clips
Jeanette MacDonald singing in her movies got the ball rolling for my lifelong interest in opera.
Greta Garbo as diva Rita Cavallini with an Italo-Swedish accent.
I love the use of the Liebestod at the end of Romeo + Juliet. It’s such a lush, romantic way to end the movie. The most Baz Lurhmann thing ever.
Impossible to pick any one film clip, but it’s hard to imagine a more evocative use of operatic music than Lars von Trier‘s Melancholia.
I think Babette’s Feast is a more or less perfect film and has been my favorite since the first time I saw it.
The thing that inspires me about Pavarotti’s performance here is that this is the piece within the opera that everyone in the audience is waiting to hear.
Philippe Jaroussky conducts a performance recorded last month in Montpellier featuring Levy Sekgapane
Anna Paquin cries at the opera to the Barcarolle from Tales of Hoffmann (Renée Fleming and Susan Graham)
It’s mad! It’s gay! It’s Michael Fabiano singing “Come un bel dì di maggio” from Andrea Chénier!
One of the most striking uses of opera in television appears in HBO’s The Leftovers.
The Peruvian tenor Luigi Alva has died at 98.
I’m cheating by choosing TV over a movie, but I can’t not pick the Hamlet episode of Gilligan’s Island.
It’s a total fraud, but I have always loved Maytime‘s “Csaritza” a fake “MGM” opera based on themes from Tchaikovsky‘s 5th symphony.
A live broadcast from New York
A brutal, chilling, gory final scene leading to a triumphant and goose bumps inducing final moments.
Tell us: What’s your favorite Verdi performance?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
