Oh, Rossini, Rossini! You mad, adorable fool! What power could you find in the theaters of Paris to keep you from Neapolitan arms? If you are fond of Rossini (or any other major composer), you will want to collect the whole set. Each piece of the jigsaw adds detail to the picture, but there are […]
David Daniels (left) headlines a special sneak preview of The Enchanted Island on Wednesday, December 7 at The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space. Also on hand will be Danielle de Niese, Lisette Oropesa and Luca Pisaroni, plus the pasticcio’s creative team, writer Jeremy Sams and director-designer team Phelim McDermott and Julian Crouch. Midge Woolsey hosts. […]
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).
Yes, in this interview with Naomi Lewin, the word “fiasco” gets thrown around a lot.
There were rumors all day in the usual places, on the search string: Philip Glass, Lincoln Center, OWS. The opera, though hypnotic, passed quickly, and Glass took a curtain call, got a hero’s welcome. Well, we thought, he can’t be both places at once.
UPDATE: Philip Glass emerged from the Met tonight to read to the General Assembly (via mic check) the final lines from Satyagraha: “When righteousness/ Withers away/ And evil / Rules the Land /We come into being /Age after age/ And take visible shape /And move / A man among men/ For the protection/ Of good […]
Here’s a new idea La Cieca hopes will meeting with the approval of you, the cher public: a schedule of chats for the upcoming month, centered around the Met’s Saturday afternoon broadcasts and the “Listen Live” features during the week. Comments and addenda are, as always, welcome.
A press release just received from the Met ends with what feels like a SAT question that didn’t quite make it out of the gate. The background on the company’s impending HD of Faust includes the following tantalizing paragraph: “The traditional setting for Faust is 16th-century Germany, a time when alchemists and philosophers were familiar […]
Local 802 and AGMA have rejected New York City Opera’s “final offer,” placing the company at an “impasse,” according to an email from George Steel to members of the company’s board.
Composer Philip Glass will appear this evening in support of Occupy Museums in Lincoln Center plaza during the Met’s final performance this season of his Satyagraha. The demonstration is described by Occupy Museums as “an open conversation at 10:30 pm about the effects of increased privatization and corporatization of all aspects of society, and the […]
Which summer festival, barely an hour north of Manhattan, will offer as its opera performances in the summer of 2012 Rossini’s Ciro in Babilonia (with Ewa Podles, Jessica Pratt and Michael Spyres) and Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi (with Kate Aldrich, Eglise Gutierrez and Leonardo Capalbo)?
“An atomic explosion kicked off the last act of Gounod’s Faust Tuesday at the Met, but the production as a whole was more dud than bomb.” [New York Post]
La Cieca (illustration courtesy of the Wall Street Journal) invites you, the cher public, to enjoy a chat tonight during the prima of Gounod’s Faust from the Met.
At one time, the idea of a performance of La Gioconda conjured up images of over-the-top, competitive, passionate vocalism, and big personalities. As a vehicle for great singers (and especially a great protagonist), it was thrilling.
Nicely readable profile of Jonas Kaufmann in the Wall Street Journal today, but how come it’s illustrated with a drawing of Neil Diamond?
It’s kind of shocking, when you really think about it, that the kind of international operatic model that the Royal Opera now operates on barely existed only 50 years ago. Until around 1960 most of the performances at the Covent Garden were given in English and the casting choices were enough to make the Vicar […]
Leave it to those Torontonians to blow the lid off an opera story happening in New York! (Goodness knows the local journalists don’t bother.)
La Cieca’s looking for a few good commenters to join the exalted ranks of parterre reviewers of new CD and DVD releases. Care to apply? Read on after the jump.
Soprano Mirella Freni is under investigation by the Bologna District Attorney’s office of Bologna for money laundering and exportation of money abroad in connection with the BER bank. The artist from Modena, 76, will be heard by the magistrates in the next few days to clarify her position, now that the DA Antonella Scandellari has […]
La Cieca insists you, the cher public, observe the “no whispering” rule during the performance, but, come intermission time, you are encouraged to chatter on and on about anything and nothing this week of November 27.
Indeed those were Cretan windmills seen in the most recent Regie quiz, and once that fact was established, manou and MontyNostry quickly closed the case: the opera is indeed Idomeneo, as performed at the Tiroler Landestheater in a production by Peer Boysen. You’ll find more to puzzle over after the jump.
Our Own Betsy (seen at left in an “unretouched” photo) declares, “Good evening, horror-lovers, and welcome to Tales from the Box. This is your Olde Box-Keeper with a gruesome fewsome to feed your screamin’ Mimìs. Tonight we pay tribute to the upcoming prima at the Met of Fausit, in which an old man pays for […]
All La Cieca can say is that so very many of you here shine in diamond splendor, and she only hopes she can stream even a single ray of light into the night of your heart. The results of the “Ian Bostridge” competition are after the jump.
La Cieca is sure that you, the cher public, will have the mostess’ of fun this week with the vast selection of operatic activities available in New York, which is why she’s offering you a few brief recommendations after the jump.
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