Questo e Quello
It’s been a bitterly cold winter in NY. When it’s bitterly cold, the air is dry.
We must be doubly grateful that The English Concert’s recent Theodora was so quickly followed by the American Classical Orchestra’s fine Samson on Tuesday evening at Alice Tully Hall.
parterre box has obtained a memo sent to artists’ managers in which AGMA Executive Director Alan Gordon warns singers contracted to sing at the Met in the 2014-2105 season that due to unpromising developments in upcoming labor negotiations the company may be dark for part or all of the season.
“Matthias Goerne is stepping into the title role in tonight’s opening night performance of Berg’s Wozzeck, replacing Thomas Hampson, who has withdrawn due to illness.”
From Mike Richter‘s CD-ROM “El Anillo,” here is radiant soprano Gré Brouwenstijn in the first act of Die Walküre as performed at the Teatro Colon in 1962.
The highlight of the Bayerische Staatsoper’s 2014-2015 season is a new production of Manon Lescaut featuring Anna Netrebko and Jonas Kaufmann, directed by Claus Guth.
Issue #43 of parterre box, the queer opera zine is called “Marc Two” in honor of dramatic soprano Alessandra Marc, subject of an interview with Our Own JJ.
I am grateful to Sony for this new release
of the Metropolitan Opera’s latest production of Parsifal and I hope I’m not the only one who discovers what a rich experience this opera can be because of it.
“Billy Zane, star of James Cameron’s blockbuster Titanic and Broadway’s Chicago, cast as Captain von Trapp.”
“Men have been known to sniff scornfully at the crazy notion of putting beets into soup, but those who protest most violently are usually the first to come back for a second helping.”
Jean-François Borras will make his Met debut in the title role of Massenet’s Werther at this evening’s performance, replacing Jonas Kaufmann, who is ill.
Anna Netrebko sings “Sola, perduta, abbandonata” from Manon Lescaut at the Rome Opera, Riccardo Muti conducting.
Which age-appropriate role will serve as the vehicle the return of a veteran diva to the New York stage for the first time this century?
“The Valerie Masterson of our generation!”
Andris Nelsons led the Vienna Philharmonic in a performance of Salome that provided just the sort of thing one hopes for in a concert performance of an overflowingly rich operatic score.
Hoist up your petticoats and get ready for a lively discussion of off-topic and general interest subjects, cher public.
We were not at Carnegie Hall to hear superb opera singers bestow their vocalism upon Alban Berg’s Wozzeck; we are there to hear the Wiener Staatsoper’s house band work their magic upon an intricate, spooky, devastating score.
“Who makes these huge sandwiches? Godzilla? You need claws to unwrap the cellophane.”
“Kim Kardashian Reportedly Ditches Date at Vienna Opera Ball After Disturbing Blackface Incident”
My impossible wish would be to hear one of the great castrati who dominated opera for most of the 18th century.
He wrote an opera ostensibly about the horrors of dehumanization in which the empty characters exist only to be manipulated for his ulterior motives.
Yes. Yes, that is what the review of Los Angeles Opera’s Billy Budd actually said.
The last place you’d expect to find opera at all, let alone good, exciting opera, is in still-scrappy Bushwick, Brooklyn.
“I have never driven a car because it always seemed to me a tax on one’s nervous system, and my only time for driving was when I was trying to store, rather than expend, energy.”
Tell us: What’s your favorite Verdi performance?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
