diva
Who, La Cieca asks, could disagree with this sentiment? Particularly when it is expressed so, well, expressively by the divine Jacqueline van Quaille in Tintin, the Musical (Kuifje de musical). The scene opens as Bianca Castafiore, the Milanese Nightingale, prepares to go onstage for a performance of Faust. She pauses a moment to read a…
3 comments
Alexandrina Pendatchanska summons the spirits!
Sponsored
Reach your audience through parterre box!
parterre box, “the most essential blog in opera” (New York Times), is now booking display and sponsored content advertising for the 2023-2024 season. Join Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Warner Classics and many others in reaching your target audience through parterre box.
The month of June in New York traditionally offers scant little in the way of operatic entertainment beyond the Met’s Parks concerts. And so the premiere of an opera-themed play off-Broadway sounds like particularly good news. The show is called The Second Tosca, and it is described as “a contemporary comedy that takes place backstage…
Although the cult TV hit Gilmore Girls has just ended its run after seven seasons on the CW, La Cieca thought you might enjoy a video featuring the “missing” Gilmore Girl (Miss Gail, that is.)
Sponsored
Win tickets to Piotr Beczala at Carnegie Hall!
pb—with our friends at Carnegie Hall—is giving away two tickets to PB’s December concert. Enter now!
The return of Unnatural Acts of Opera continues with another rarity, Respighi’s 1934 grand opera La fiamma. Starring in this tale of witchcraft in medieval Ravenna is American soprano Alessandra Marc as the mysterious Silvana. According to Will Crutchfield‘s review of this live 1987 performance in the New York Times, La Marc’s “voice is full,…
The legendary mezzo-soprano celebrated her 97th birthday on May 12. In this clip she is seen rehearsing with Franco Corelli for a 1963 production of Cavalleria Rusticana, and then in an interview from 2003.
La Cieca is totally in awe of the insightful (and totally enjoyable) reporting her baby sister OperaChic is doing on the most recent Angela Gheorghiu scandale. In what La Cieca chooses to regard as an early 50th anniversary hommage to one of the most infamous moments in the career of Maria Callas, la Gheorghiu has,…
DRAMA on the front page of today’s NYT Arts section! Ruth Ann Swenson comes out swinging at the Met for “snubbing” her in favor of younger and less zaftig artists. Her current run of Cleopatras in Giulio Cesare is her final contact with the Met*, apparently the end to a 20-season career there spanning over…
On April 17, Dame Kiri te Kanawa returns to the scene of… well, not a crime, actually, more like a triumph: that is, her surprise Met debut in Otello way back in 1974. No, she’s not singing, but on April 17 she will make a personal appearance at the Metropolitan Opera Shop, to greet her…
Something new and interesting (La Cieca hopes) on Unnatural Acts of Opera: a 2004 concert performance of Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi, starring Anna Netrebko (Giulietta), Daniela Barcellona (Romeo) and Joseph Calleja (Tebaldo). Act One is the current podcast, with the second to follow on Friday. Speaking of the lovely Miss Netrebko, she and…
Even as she toys with the idea of yet another emergence from semi-retirement, Madame Vera Galupe-Borszkh is divesting herself of some of her most celebrated frocks. An Ebay auction continuing through March 27 offers such cult couture as the Manon “St. Sulpice” gown and an argentate mantle worn by Madame’s hysterically hieratic Turandot. Also included…
Our editor JJ‘s busy week included a review of the Met’s Aegyptische Helena in Gay City News, and that panel La Cieca has been yammering about all week. As his presentation on the topic “Opera and Technology,” JJ introduced this little documentary about your own La Cieca.
La Cieca has just been informed that soprano Mary Dunleavy will participate in tonight’s panel discussion “Opera and Technology” at The Italian Academy for Advanced Studies in America at Columbia University. No word on whether La Dunleavy replaces or supplements the previously announced Lucy Shelton. Our own JJ will be there of course, along with…
From today’s Daily News coverage of Naomi Campbell‘s community service: “Decked out in a pencil skirt, leather trench coat and cloche hat, the supermodel sure knows how to make sweeping the floor look good every day of the week. “On Monday, she opted for Christian Louboutin boots, an Azzedine Alaia coat and Chanel cap, while…
Sponsored
Win tickets to Piotr Beczala at Carnegie Hall!
pb—with our friends at Carnegie Hall—is giving away two tickets to PB’s December concert. Enter now!
"*" indicates required fields