Questo e Quello
On this day in 1955 “The Ballad of Davy Crockett” became the #1 record in the United States.
As the Deutsche Grammophon producer for the 1972 Metropolitan Opera Carmen recording, I was delighted to read Patrick Mack’s review of its recent re-release on a surround-sound/stereo CD set.
On this say in 1961 Gypsy closed at the Broadway Theater after 702 performances.
On this day in 1913 the Palace Theater opened at 1564 Broadway in New York City.
If works like Salome and Erwartung defined modernism in the first decades of the 20th century, Die Tote Stadt and Palestrina represented the regressive avant garde.
The opening night of the Metropolitan Opera of September 1972 was supposed to be the dawn of a new era.
Was he listening to a lot of Meyerbeer?
On this day in 1901 Dame Nellie Melba revealed the recipe for her eponymous toast.
The Metropolitan Opera yesterday afternoon was an uncommonly cozy place, as the auditorium was packed to the rafters with friends and family members of the nine National Council Audition Finalists.
As I leaned forward the woman in front of me turned to her seatmate and very quietly, in a voice thick with emotion and not a few tears, said, “it’s so beautiful.”
A performance space called the Sheen Center has opened its doors way down the far end of Bleecker Street, a stoner’s throw from where CBGB’s used to thrive beside the itsy-bitsy Amato Opera House. (You never forget your first Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio.) Sheen Center, sizable and modern and slim on personality, contains two…
If you can tear yourself away adrming from the scenery long enough, cher public, now’s the time for conversations on general interest and off-topic subjects.
What makes Norma such a high-profile role in the soprano repertory?
Born on this day in 1867 American director and producer Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr.
Longtime Friend of the Box Zachary Woolfe (left) climbs onto the masthead of the New York Times as their new classical music editor, starting Monday.
On this day in 1991, the Los Angeles County Superior Court awarded singer Peggy Lee $3.83 million in her lawsuit against the Walt Disney Company.
La Cieca is sure that Meyerbeer fanatics will be delighted to hear that the Royal Opera House Covent Garden is preparing a new staging of Les Huguenots.
>Happy 100th birthday actress Patricia Morison.
“’They’re young… they’re in love… and they kill people’ goes the tagline for the 1968 film Bonnie and Clyde, but the slogan could apply almost as well to the outlaw pair at the center of the Metropolitan Opera’s white-hot revival of Massenet’s Manon.”
On this day in 1963 the musical Tovarich opened at the Broadway Theater.
Zeljko Lucic has withdrawn from his spring Met engagements due to illness.
Just discovered: a Swedish documentary about Birgit Nilsson.
On this day in 1901 a showing of seventy-one Vincent van Gogh paintings in Paris, 11 years after his death, created a sensation.
Tell us: What’s your favorite Verdi performance?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
