I, Claudio I, Claudio

Claudio Abbado made his Met debut on 7 October 1968 conducting Verdi’s Don Carlo, led five more performances through 14 November, and then never returned. Chris’s Cache offers the only complete recording I’ve run across from that run.

This summer I’m reading <em>The Music Goes Round</em> This summer I’m reading <em>The Music Goes Round</em>

The earliest days of recording told by F.W. Gaisberg, the man who recorded Patti, Melba, Moreschi, and Tamagno among many others.

Ah! Bella a me ritorna Ah! Bella a me ritorna

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

This summer I’m reading <em>Mawrdew Czgowchwz</em> This summer I’m reading <em>Mawrdew Czgowchwz</em>

(What else?)

New world charm New world charm

The Met Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin surges into summer with a mixed program at Carnegie Hall

They call me the wanderer They call me the wanderer

Kent Nagano‘s and the Richard-Wagner-Akademie‘s historically informed Ring Cycle takes on Siegfried in Dresden

This summer I’m reading <em>Evening in the Palace of Reason: Bach Meets Frederick the Great in the Age of Enlightenment </em> This summer I’m reading <em>Evening in the Palace of Reason: Bach Meets Frederick the Great in the Age of Enlightenment </em>

Not really an opera book but, c’mon, it’s Bach.

Peter Grimes Peter Grimes

Nicky Spence sings the title role in a performance recorded earlier this spring in Cardiff

Carmen Carmen

Gäelle Arquez sings the title role in a live broadcast from Rome

This summer I’m reading <em>A Time to Sing</em> This summer I’m reading <em>A Time to Sing</em>

I did not expect Dorothy Kirsten‘s autobiography to be so rewarding a read: I did so twice.

Hey now, hear what I say now Hey now, hear what I say now

A reminder to relax and refresh this summer by sharing your innermost operatic thoughts for The Talk of the Town

All about her stepmother All about her stepmother

A new recording by the London Symphony Orchestra is the latest landmark in a spring full of Janácek‘s Jenufa

Dialogues des Carmélites Dialogues des Carmélites

A live broadcast from Venice featuring Anna Caterina Antonacci as Madame de Croissy

Girl of summer Girl of summer

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

The Comet/Poppea The Comet/Poppea

Yuval Sharon and the American Modern Opera Company meld Monteverdi and George Lewis in a live performance from Lincoln Center

This summer I’m reading <em>The Divas</em> by Robert Merrill This summer I’m reading <em>The Divas</em> by Robert Merrill

A juicy, guilty pleasure read!

Drama therapy Drama therapy

Carmen in Brussels is dramatically vibrant, if vocally stretched

Sea no evil Sea no evil

A muted production challenges a talented cast in San Francisco Opera’s Idomeneo

This summer I’m reading <em>Verdi: A novel of the opera</em> This summer I’m reading <em>Verdi: A novel of the opera</em>

According to the memoirs of Alma Mahler, her third husband, Franz Werfel used to wander around the cafés of Paris with one of his chums, singing arias from obscure Verdi operas at the top of their lungs until the management would ask them to move on.

Dream girl Dream girl

Chris’s Cache offers an early 80th birthday salute to Jessye Norman with broadcasts of Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius, and Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder plus a pair of opera arias by Verdi and Mascagni from a 1979 Atlanta Symphony concert with Robert Shaw.

This summer I’m reading <em>Cavalleria rusticana</em> This summer I’m reading <em>Cavalleria rusticana</em>

Giovanni Verga‘s short story (which he adapted as a play with Giuseppe Giacosa) provides the basis for Mascagni‘s famous opera.

Charm city offensive Charm city offensive

A starry concert Aïda in Baltimore proves unusually polished

The head on the cake plate The head on the cake plate

John Yohalem reports on Catapult Opera’s satiating San Giovanni Battista

Der Rosenkavalier Der Rosenkavalier

A live video broadcast from Vienna