Express your elf!
La Cieca (pictured) would like to remind those members of the cher public with last-minute gift shopping needs that purchases from the Little Shop of Arias completed today (Friday) can still reach the recipient by December 24.
Recent Stories
The singing dead
“Somehow with opera, just as with theatre, it turns out that the monster’s head still hasn’t been cut off. Or else, like any monster worthy of the name, it keeps finding ways to rise from the grave.” Occasional friend of the box Joseph Cermatori offers an obituary of sorts for opera in New York in […]
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
Wait… what?
“La Scala has canceled the inaugural ballet of its season because of a strike by the chorus.”
Ribbed for your discomfort
The Trojan Horse seemed like a great idea—that is, until it led to disaster.
Gentlemen prefer blinds
Which heaven-sent young artist is about to make a late Christmas present of his talents to an opera house that now (uselessly, no doubt) regrets not casting him in the first place?
Blind date
While male half of a famous operatic couple has now become involved with a “chick” with whom he recently co-starred?
The wanton doyenne
La Cieca invites all of you to spend this intermission in a constructive way: not rioting for Italian independence, but discussing off-topic and general interest subjects, as people do.
No place like Rome
Love grand opera but wary of a six o’clock curtain with five hours of music behind it? (And nothing is grander than Berlioz’s Les Troyens, eh?) Your dilemma has been solved. Show up at the Met at 7:30 or 8:00, whenever they have the first intermission.
Today’s secret word is Regie
Perhaps La Cieca did not quite play fair with you on the most recent Regie quiz, cher public.
Water stories
You can see the logic of it: The Juilliard School wants to show off its opera program, the Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts, which is (on the evidence) brim-full of talent.
Be very afraid
Turn of the Screw is an incredibly frightening ghost story really at the heart of it but with a very modern edge.
Wingless victory
Of particular visual interest in last weekend’s Lohengrin (though not perhaps so tantalizing as Jonas Kaufmann‘s aristocratic bare feet, pictured above) is the very obvious change in the staging that was made between the antegenerale (in which Anja Harteros sang Elsa) and the telecast opening night.
Galina Vishnevskaya 1926-2012
The soprano and political dissident of the postwar Soviet Union died yesterday in Moscow. She was 86.
Lisa della Casa 1919-2012
The elegant Swiss-born soprano has died at 93.
Divas merrily on high
Cecilia Bartoli and Joyce DiDonato are not the only ladies who have recorded recitals this year featuring music from the 17th and 18th centuries.
Una donna misteriosa ognora
Soprano Kristin Lewis will sing the role of Maddalena in Opera Orchestra of New York’s presentation of Andrea Chenier on January 6.
Carry on Cleo
Natalie Dessay coyly bares a breast on the cover of Virgin Classics’ new Giulio Cesare.
Two pairs of pants
“French mezzo-soprano Géraldine Chauvet will make her Met debut as Sesto in this evening’s performance of Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito, replacing Elina Garanca, who is ill.”
“Say that La Cieca leaves her loge in disgust at the travesty they call Art in this opera house!”
Actually, Lohengrin at La Scala wasn’t all that bad, so the reports go.
Don’t mask, don’t tell
But do chat this afternoon, cher public, during the season opener of the Metropolitan Opera’s 2012-2013 Saturday matinee broadcasts.
Leather underground
Putting in a little face time (and what faces!) at Charles Castronovo‘s cabaret at 54 Below last night were barihunk trifecta Erwin Schrott, Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Ildar Abdrazakov.
What the well-dressed Alexandrian will wear
“The courtesan’s entourage included dancing girls in filmy harem pants and bedazzled Afro wigs, and the hunky chorus boys pranced about in velour leggings, codpieces and nipple ornaments.”
Bear in mind
Before there was a Stefan Herheim Boheme (which I reviewed a couple of weeks back for this site), there was a Herheim Eugene Onegin, recorded in June 2011 at De Nederlanse Opera.