Grand Tier Grab Bag
Stimulating morsels from here, there, and everywhere around the opera world.
Stimulating morsels from here, there, and everywhere around the opera world.
Nobody emotes like Joyce DiDonato, and this week Parterre Box spotlights her new recording of Dido and Aeneas with a look at a recent live performance in the part.
This week, Parterre Box features summer Einspringerin Marigona Qerkezi in some different Verdi fare.
Wagner month at Parterre Box concludes in grand and explosive style: octogenarian Hanna Schwarz and sexagenarian Karita Mattila in crucial moments from Das Rheingold and Lohengrin.
Surprised that none of our favorite Wagner performances happen to come from Tannhaüser, Parterre Box turns to Russell Thomas to fill the gap
The start of the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro provides a perfect opportunity to enjoy a bit of the breathtaking Vasilisa Berzhanskaya recorded there last summer
In the midst of an eventful summer for the Arena di Verona, one important happening has flown under the radar: the return of Anita Rachvelishvili to her signature role of Carmen, of which Parterre Box features a sample of today
A recent review of Olga Maslova as Aïda is as good a reason as any to share a clip of her fascinating Turandot
Bryn Terfel‘s presence on an unfortunate broadcast of Tosca from Tanglewood last week prompts us at the Box to share clips of his work over the past few weeks
With the 2025 Bayreuth Festival beginning next week, Grand Tier Grab Bag spotlights the Eva of its opening Meistersinger: Christina Nilsson
The opening of Teatro Nuovo’s Macbeth next week is the first of two opportunities this year to hear the opera in its original 1847 Version
The opening of the Santa Fe Opera’s season is the perfect occasion to highlight its Susanna, American soprano Liv Redpath
What better a way to honor Independence Day than with a bit of French-American partnering?
parterre box serves up an amuse-bouche of Natalie Dessay as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd in Strasbourg!
parterre box highlights the livestreamed opening of this year’s Munich Opera Festival with a bit of tonight’s Don Giovanni, Konstantin Krimmel, in another Mozart opera
Norma returns La Scala this week for the first time in nearly 40 years and parterre box marks the occasion with titular druidess Marina Rebeka singing a bit of Verdi
parterre box looks forward to the official start of summer tomorrow with a wistfully pointed performance of Samuel Barber‘s “Knoxville: Summer of 1915” by soprano Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha
Two women singing an operatic love duet is virtually an everyday occurrence, but two men? Not so much.
parterre box celebrates the beginning of Pride Month with a throwback to one of the queerer events in recent operatic memory: a bit of Carmen starring Jamie Barton and Stephanie Blythe!
Corinne Winters is back at the Met and back in the pages of parterre box, which inclines us to share a bit of Winters in Jenufa
Antony and Cleopatra is perhaps not the showcase Elizabeth DeShong deserves, so Grand Tier Grab Bag highlights the superlative mezzo in two clips
It’s mad! It’s gay! It’s Michael Fabiano singing “Come un bel dì di maggio” from Andrea Chénier!
parterre box presents for your comparing pleasure excerpts of three Italian sopranos trying their (poker) hands at Puccini’s Minnie: Carmen Giannatasio, Chiara Isotton, and Anna Pirozzi
While the thoroughly established Lawrence Brownlee reprises his familiar Count Almaviva in the Met’s Barbiere di Siviglia, parterre box calls your attention to another Mr. Brownlee making waves: Nicholas Brownlee.
When a revival of Handel‘s Ariodante in Boston coincides with the HD relay of the Met’s current revival of Le nozze di Figaro, parterre box can’t help but share a bit of Olga Kulchynska, the Met’s Susanna, singing the florid “Volate amori.”
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.
