Recent Stories
It’s a dazzling, shocking, and entertaining 100 minutes – one of the best new operas I’ve seen.
Washington National Opera is leaving the Kennedy Center, according to The New York Times
Tobias Kratzer digs beneath the surface of Strauss‘s Intermezzo in an excellent new DVD from Deutsche Oper Berlin.
I still don’t think Sunset Boulevard is a top-tier musical but it was by far the most memorable vocal performance I saw in 2025.
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.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Grand Tier Grab Bag
León in winter
León in winter
Ahead of his performance in Les pêcheurs de perles with Washington Concert Opera, Parterre Box features the unusually elegant Anthony León performing Mozart.
Ahead of his performance in Les pêcheurs de perles with Washington Concert Opera, Parterre Box features the unusually elegant Anthony León performing Mozart.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Assai più vale il soglio
che un genitor perduto
Assai più vale il soglio
che un genitor perduto
Parterre Box highlights a busy few months of Verdi performances for Marina Rebeka and Ludovic Tézier with an exciting sample of their debuts in Nabucco.
Parterre Box highlights a busy few months of Verdi performances for Marina Rebeka and Ludovic Tézier with an exciting sample of their debuts in Nabucco.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Women’s liberation
Women’s liberation
Parterre Box highlights two recent Verdi Requiems of interest with a pair of Libera mes from Asmik Grigorian and Anna Netrebko.
Parterre Box highlights two recent Verdi Requiems of interest with a pair of Libera mes from Asmik Grigorian and Anna Netrebko.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Ash and you shall receive
Ash and you shall receive
Bellini and Donizetti may be top of mind these days, so Parterre Box offers two budding belcantisti, Beth Taylor and Dave Monaco, in a duet from Rossini’s La cenerentola.
Bellini and Donizetti may be top of mind these days, so Parterre Box offers two budding belcantisti, Beth Taylor and Dave Monaco, in a duet from Rossini’s La cenerentola.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
When her ship comes in
When her ship comes in
Anticipating the titanic arrival of Lise Davidsen‘s Isolde in New York in March, Parterre Box is thrilled to share a bit of her debut opposite Clay Hilley recorded in Barcelona last week.
Anticipating the titanic arrival of Lise Davidsen‘s Isolde in New York in March, Parterre Box is thrilled to share a bit of her debut opposite Clay Hilley recorded in Barcelona last week.
Grand Tier Grab Bag
Erste Brautnacht
Erste Brautnacht
Nearly three years after the premiere of François Girard’s Lohengrin at the Met, Parterre Box looks back at the production with a duet from Piotr Beczala and Elena Stikhina.
Nearly three years after the premiere of François Girard’s Lohengrin at the Met, Parterre Box looks back at the production with a duet from Piotr Beczala and Elena Stikhina.
Ahead of the return of Louise to the Opéra National de Lyon, Parterre Box features Elsa Dreisig in a much more famous French opera.
A messy new I puritani at the Met is a historic and historical disappointment.
Elina Garanča scaled the vocal and dramatic summits of the Judgement Duet and Scene in the May series of Aïda.
“Call me traditional, but I want to see a silver platter!”
A staged Freischütz is rare enough in itself to be the highlight of any opera season, but it was in Christoph Marthaler‘s Antwerp production that I connected with the characters and felt the story for the first time.
Houston Grand Opera’s 2025 Breaking the Waves was absolutely my highlight of the year!
Talk of the Town
The Talk of the Town
The 1946 La traviata is so overrated
The 1946 La traviata is so overrated
For all his undeniable precision and discipline, I still find Toscanini’s tempi rushed and unyielding and his lack of rubato a chilly turnoff.
For all his undeniable precision and discipline, I still find Toscanini’s tempi rushed and unyielding and his lack of rubato a chilly turnoff.
The Talk of the Town
The 1957 Anna Bolena is so overrated
The 1957 Anna Bolena is so overrated
While the three leads do sing the material well, there has been a glut of recordings since then which are more complete and at least as well sung.
While the three leads do sing the material well, there has been a glut of recordings since then which are more complete and at least as well sung.
The Talk of the Town
The Solti Ring Cycle is so overrated
The Solti Ring Cycle is so overrated
It was many decades ago that I first listened to the Solti Ring Cycle.
It was many decades ago that I first listened to the Solti Ring Cycle.
The Talk of the Town
The 1959 Aïda is so overrated
The 1959 Aïda is so overrated
Karajan’s 1959 Aïda was once treated like gospel, a wall of plush Vienna Philharmonic sound and star power that critics dutifully genuflected before.
Karajan’s 1959 Aïda was once treated like gospel, a wall of plush Vienna Philharmonic sound and star power that critics dutifully genuflected before.
The Talk of the Town
The 1973 La bohème is so overrated
The 1973 La bohème is so overrated
The Solti recording of Bohème is completely miscast.
The Solti recording of Bohème is completely miscast.
The Talk of the Town
The 2023 Turandot is so overrated
The 2023 Turandot is so overrated
The recent highly hyped studio recording of Puccini’s Turandot left me greatly disappointed.
The recent highly hyped studio recording of Puccini’s Turandot left me greatly disappointed.
Dan Johnson gives an inside look at the creation of Sarah Kirkland Snider‘s rapturous new opera Hildegard which opens at New York’s PROTOTYPE Festival next week.
Fine music-making meets a clunker of a production in La Monnaie‘s revival of Norma
This week, Parterre Box shares Quinn Kelsey and Jennifer Rowley in a duet from a Verdi opera rumored to be returning to New York this time next season.
In the spring, The English Concert completed a three-city tour performing a concert version of Handel’s Giulio Cesare in Egitto.
Two weeks remain for you to submit your thoughts for this spring’s The Talk of the Town.
What better sentiment can we embrace as the year ends then to hope, often against against hope, for peace and love in a world of chaos?