Patrick Mack
Patrick Mack starting listening to opera as a teenager to the total bewilderment of his rock and roll mother. He sang leading roles in the opera departments of Santa Monica College and UCLA and for two years in the Baltimore Symphony Chorus. In 2003 he joined the tenor section of The Verdi Chorus which has been giving young singers paid performance opportunities for over 30 years. He has served on their Board of
Directors since 2012 and handles their publicity, marketing, and Facebook page. Patrick is a luxury cruise consultant with All-Travel in
Los Angeles and was honored as one of the Top 25 Travel Agents in the country in 2015 by Travel Agent Magazine. Having weaned himself from an
early age on the musical opinions of Andrew Porter in the New Yorker, he has been wielding the critics pen on Parterre.com since 2011.
His singing of the national anthem has never failed to impress those standing closest to him at any public event he attends.
Out of sheer morbid curiosity last evening I pulled up the “orders” page of my Amazon account and searched Otello to discover that over the past 11 years. I’ve ordered 15 items with that title (one as recently as last night!)
By Patrick Mack
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Welcome, beloveds, to the Jessye Norman Memorial Museum. I’ll be the docent for your tour today.
By Patrick Mack
This was by far my most satisfying experience with Pelléas et Mélisande for a multitude of reasons and I encourage anyone who’s even mildly curious to find their way to the Music Center for a very rich experience.
By Patrick Mack
Frankly I thought Sondra Radvanovsky had reached her pinnacle with her Norma but I was apparently mistaken. I’m happy to say her Turandot is completely next-level.
By Patrick Mack
For anyone who thought that Downton Abbey, with its plot lines divided between the gentry and their faithful (or not-so) servants was somehow unique, that particular tale, and lo its many variations, has been told in one form or another since Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais put quill to paper in 1778 with La Folle Journée, ou Le Mariage de Figaro.
By Patrick Mack
When I saw that Richard Bonynge AC CBE, conductor and musicologist supreme, had authored a book titled Chalet Monet about the home he shared with his wife, La Dame Joan Sutherland OM AC DBE, in Les Avants, Switzerland I practically had to wipe my chin.
By Patrick Mack
I have a horrible confession. I’ve always judged the quality of an opera largely on the number of dead characters at the finale.
By Patrick Mack
The audience greeted the opening night of Omar with more genuine enthusiasm than I have ever seen at Los Angeles Opera.
By Patrick Mack
LA Opera sent out an email warning that the production “contains depictions of blood, violence, and drug use, as well as strobe lights and a gunshot effect in Act III.”
By Patrick Mack
Your favorite box set-aholic here completely missed the release last August of Giuseppe Di Stefano – Complete Decca Recordings in honor of the great tenor’s centenary.
By Patrick Mack
We open in a war room that resembled nothing so much as a parking garage. Amneris’s boudoir was certainly recognizable as such but I’d be hard-pressed to pinpoint the location of the Triumphal Scene other than the inside of a large discothèque.
By Patrick Mack
It’s nice to see Sony Classical backing a serious operatic soprano and not some crossover refugee from Britain’s Got Talent or another syrupy Christmas album from the world’s reigning Heldentenor.
By Patrick Mack
Ms. Damrau unleashed a Blitzkrieg of charm upon her audience.
By Patrick Mack
From the multiple standing ovations, to say nothing of the gentleman in the front row waving the Mexican flag, I can safely say that a very good time was had by all.
By Patrick Mack
Los Angeles Opera’s St. Matthew Passion was by equal parts challenging and hypnotic to watch.
By Patrick Mack
We have two reasons for celebrating Jessye Norman and the first is a release on the BBC / London Philharmonic Orchestra label of a Richard Strauss concert.
By Patrick Mack
The sonic wizards of the Netherlands at Pentatone have released their latest in the series of Maestro Lawrence Foster’s studio opera recordings. Reunited with his Lisbon forces, the Gulbenkian Orquestra and Coro, for a fresh take on Puccini’s three-hanky weeper.
By Patrick Mack
In spite of the fact that Rossini and his librettist Jacopo Ferretti removed all the magical elements from the story, therefore making it far easier to produce, there was more than enough enchantment in the singing, and intermittently in the production to enjoy.
By Patrick Mack
You’d think after nearly 40 years of opera going I’d have seen almost everything.. .twice. Yet I found myself at LA Opera Tuesday night for a special presentation of George Frideric Handel’s Alcina which was my first live experience with one of his operas.
By Patrick Mack
Remember that time you went to the opera and the whole evening was like magic? Saturday night at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion probably ranks among my greatest nights in the theater and I’m finding the superlatives in my thesaurus inadequate to the task.
By Patrick Mack
Let’s all cast our minds back to March of 2020. Or, better, let’s not.
By Patrick Mack
When LA Opera finally decided to put a toe in the water and mount its first production since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, it was Igor Stravinsky‘s opera/oratorio Oedipus Rex.
By Patrick Mack
This solid if not stellar performance finds our diva in particularly passionate form. Maybe they should have re-titled it Maddalena?
By Patrick Mack
Giacomo Puccini’s La fanciulla del West may have its detractors (Stravinsky referred to it as a “horse-opera’) but you will not find me among them.
By Patrick Mack
