Reviews
And what a sonically fascinating and vibrant Atys it is!
Boston Symphony Orchestra recently confirmed an infinitely renewable contract upon Andris Nelsons, its music director since 2014. To understand why, one needed little more evidence than the outfit’s recent visit to Carnegie Hall.
The newest Italian production of L’incoronazione di Poppea was a splendid example of how a 17th century opera can be performed in the best possible way today
The flashing eyes, the floating hair, and the inexplicable barefootnedness during the second half of Saturday night’s performance confirmed one thing: Kristine Opolais is back.
Anyone arriving at Lyric Opera of Chicago’s production of Rossini’s Cinderella (La Cenerentola) expecting the Disney-fied version of the story will be in for a surprise.
It says something about Boston’s opera scene that one of the most consistently ambitious events of the opera season is a one-off performance played by the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras.
Light streamed through the stained-glass windows of the Space at Irondale, once a church, during the Saturday matinée of Heather Christian’s Terce as part of the Prototype Festival.
Two months ago, when climate activists interrupted a performance of Tannhaüser at the Met, the banners they unfurled from the balconies announced, “no opera on a dead planet.”
Julia Bullock seems to fission herself multiple times over during the course of her newest, widely ranging recital program.
The beginning of Mary Kouyoumdjian’s Adoration is marked by silence. The young Simon, played by Sammy Ivany, lies on his stomach, scribbling in a notebook.
“The mystery of her voice gripped my soul,” Sharpless tells Pinkerton at the beginning of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. One could say the same thing of Aleksandra Kurzak’s remarkable portrayal of the title role, the main reason to catch the Met’s latest revival.
Angel Island seemed a piece with two simultaneous goals: to musically interpret the poetry of Angel Island detainees and to educate its audience on the history of Asian and particularly Chinese immigration to America.
Nothing says “diva” like an insane recital program.
Marc-Antoine Charpentier and Thomas Corneille’s Médée is a monument of the 17th century French baroque lyric tragedy.
This Carmen, in other words, was somewhat less radical than its initial image suggested.
New York shall never be in need of another Messiah to assist to during the holiday season, but a new tradition is beginning to crystallize at the cavernous St. John the Divine to rival it.
The whole performance was reminiscent of long-forgotten ways of doing opera (ways which still find the full approval of an Italian public tired of proposals that are all too “experimental”)
There is a strong case to be made that George Fridrich Handel is the composer most suited to the present moment.
A frigid air swept through the crypt of the Church of the Intercession on Friday, December 8, nearly blowing out the candles that cast a golden light on the bundled-up audience.
When the Staatskapelle Berlin announced a two-night engagement at Carnegie Hall performing all four Brahms symphonies, I immediately made a note in my calendar to attend. I also wondered who would be the conductor when the announced Daniel Barenboim inevitably withdrew.
A perfect escape for a city laden with recent layoffs and job cuts coming into Holiday season
Perhaps the greatest souvenir of her art there is.
Washington Concert Opera’s season opened with a triumphant performance of Gioachino Rossini’s rarely heard Ermione Saturday night at George Washington University in D.C., led by Antony Walker and a stellar quartet of principals in Angela Meade, Lawrence Brownlee, David Portillo, and Ginger Costa-Jackson.
In any case, we probably got as good a Tannhäuser cast as could be assembled these days.
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.
