Recent Stories
You can tell a lot about someone from their garage sale.
When is good enough not quite good enough?
Nearly 30 years after a Handel opera last played there, Carnegie Hall presented The English Concert opening a three-year opera-oratorio project on Sunday afternoon with Radamisto.
In any narrative, the unmentioned—the unmentionable—will always be more alarming than that which is carefully described.
Say this about Oedipus: The character’s got staying power.
The above showed up on the Met’s website.
The Met’s performance of Don Carlo Friday night was a tragedy, but not for the reason Verdi intended.
There is applause at the end of the opera, not none at all.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Poetic license
Poetic license
Parterre Box shines a light on Liparit Avetisyan, who made his Met debut as Alfredo earlier this spring.
Parterre Box shines a light on Liparit Avetisyan, who made his Met debut as Alfredo earlier this spring.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Frau Miina-Liisa will es werde Nacht
Frau Miina-Liisa will es werde Nacht
Parterre Box features soprano Miina-Liisa Värelä, making her title role debut in Die Walküre in Munich next week, in a performance of Tristan und Isolde from 2021.
Parterre Box features soprano Miina-Liisa Värelä, making her title role debut in Die Walküre in Munich next week, in a performance of Tristan und Isolde from 2021.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Lux aeterna luceat eis
Lux aeterna luceat eis
Grand Tier Grab Bag this week honors the late Limmie Pulliam with a bit of his Verdi Requiem.
Grand Tier Grab Bag this week honors the late Limmie Pulliam with a bit of his Verdi Requiem.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Kathryn the great
Kathryn the great
Parterre Box previews Kathryn Lewek‘s upcoming Salome with clips of her as another unhinged lady of antiquity.
Parterre Box previews Kathryn Lewek‘s upcoming Salome with clips of her as another unhinged lady of antiquity.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Count your blessings
Count your blessings
Fast-rising Verdi baritone Ariunbaatar Ganbataar is the subject of this week’s Grand Tier Grab Bag.
Fast-rising Verdi baritone Ariunbaatar Ganbataar is the subject of this week’s Grand Tier Grab Bag.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
One man’s Junker
One man’s Junker
Handel’s Deidamia — and one of its current champions, soprano Sophie Junker — are the subject of this week’s Grand Tier Grab Bag.
Handel’s Deidamia — and one of its current champions, soprano Sophie Junker — are the subject of this week’s Grand Tier Grab Bag.
Take a break from eating sweets, cher public, to participate in this week’s discussion of off-topic and general interest subjects.
Following up on last night’s information dump of the (overdue?) Met season announcement for 2013-2014, La Cieca has obtained a somewhat more detailed rundown.
“One of the things I’m gradually learning as I’m coming up my the 20th anniversary of writing about opera for publication is that you have to be wary about making Pronouncements.”
As with all good myths, certainly all the myths at the heart of Wagner’s operas, the juggling of symbols and archetypes and themes in Parsifal opens the piece to a great variety of interpretations.
La Salustia was Giovanni Batista Pergolesi’s first opera, composed at the tender age of 21. In structure and storyline it’s a conventional baroque opera seria.
Promiscuous — it’s not a pretty word. But when a matron in black underwear cavorts with two dozen naked hunks, what else can you call her?
That’s what it must have been like in 1726 London when Handel composed Alessandro for perhaps the three most famous (and expensive) singers of the day.
Like the hero of Parsifal, who finds the Holy Grail after a lifetime of frustrated wandering, the Met’s audience was finally rewarded for its patience.
Talk of the Town
The Talk of the Town
Andrée Esposito and Alain Vanzo should have made it to the Met
Andrée Esposito and Alain Vanzo should have made it to the Met
This Mireille duet unites Andrée Esposito and Alain Vanzo and shows the timbral and stylistic qualities that made them exemplary.
This Mireille duet unites Andrée Esposito and Alain Vanzo and shows the timbral and stylistic qualities that made them exemplary.
The Talk of the Town
Ebe Stignani and Anita Cerquetti should have made it to the Met
Ebe Stignani and Anita Cerquetti should have made it to the Met
Subtlety is for cowards, say the blazing Anita Cerquetti and the blaring Ebe Stignani.
Subtlety is for cowards, say the blazing Anita Cerquetti and the blaring Ebe Stignani.
The Talk of the Town
Sena Jurinac should have made it to the Met
Sena Jurinac should have made it to the Met
Sena Jurinac, a celebrated Mozart and Strauss singer here as the Composer, a signature role.
Sena Jurinac, a celebrated Mozart and Strauss singer here as the Composer, a signature role.
The Talk of the Town
Janet Baker should have made it to the Met
Janet Baker should have made it to the Met
The divine Dame Janet Baker never sang at the Metropolitan, sadly for American audiences.
The divine Dame Janet Baker never sang at the Metropolitan, sadly for American audiences.
The Talk of the Town
Dorothy Maynor should have made it to the Met
Dorothy Maynor should have made it to the Met
We had to wait for Marian Anderson to break the color barrier at the Met and many great Black opera singers never had a chance there.
We had to wait for Marian Anderson to break the color barrier at the Met and many great Black opera singers never had a chance there.
The Talk of the Town
Leyla Gencer should have made it to the Met
Leyla Gencer should have made it to the Met
Leyla Gencer had a long European career but never sang at the Met.
Leyla Gencer had a long European career but never sang at the Met.
A parterre reader just back from the matinee of Powder Her Face relates this story of two elderly ladies seated in the second row…
Sempiternal soprano Edita Gruberova celebrates her “45th stage anniversary” tomorrow, Monday February 18 with a performance of Alaide in Bellini’s La Straniera live from the Vienna Musikverein.
Like Miss Adelaide the well-known fiancée in Guys and Dolls, the New York City Opera may be down but she’s not flat as all that.
La Cieca invites the cher public (pictured) to discuss off-topic and general interest subjects.
A reminder, cher public, La Casa della Cieca opens early this evening (5:55 PM EST, to be precise).
Winter Met sensation Pretty Yende does another jump-in this weekend, again in Le Comte Ory, but this time at the Theater an der Wien.
The new Boris Godunov from the Bayerische Staatsoper (directed by Calixto Bieito and conducted by Kent Nagano) looks absolutely remarkable.
The French countertenor is 35 years old today.
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