Recent Stories
A snippet of last week’s performance of Le Grand Macabre, after the jump. There’s more video plus details on next week’s broadcast of the Ligeti at nyphil.org.
Dawn Fatale (pictured) shares with us a horoscope:
Way back in 1998, a meticulous parterre contributor (pseudo) named Ortrud Maxwell (right), penned three exhaustive articles tracing cancellations and (especially) replacements in operatic recordings up to that date. La Cieca is delighted to republish this superb series in its entirety.
I have to confess to a certain bias: I adore Rossini’s music. Barber was the first album I ever bought, and fittingly, the first opera I ever sang. Rossini was an astonishingly prolific composer, writing more than thirty-five operas, as well as numerous secular and sacred choral works, songs, and chamber music.
Linda Watson and John Treleaven have issued a joint not-apology, blaming “selective and biased representation of these interviews” for giving the impression that anything was less than stellar at the “fantastic history-making project” that is the LA Ring cycle. [Class Act via OperaChic]
With only 117 days remaining before the start of the Met’s 2010-2011 season, Olga Borodina has withdrawn from the revival of Les Contes d’Hoffmann. Stepping into the gondola will be Enkelejda Shkosa. Yes, that’s right, the lineup of Hoffmann ladies will be Elena Mosuc, Hibla Gerzmava, and Enkelejda Shkosa — at a $420 top.
The great Italian baritone died earlier today. He was 93. Taddei enjoyed a career spanning over half a century, making his Met debut at the age of 69 in 1985. [via ApCom]
After all these years of solitude, La Cieca has finally found another opera fan with a Maria Callas tattoo! More photos after the jump.
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
Goodnight, Irene
Goodnight, Irene
Grand Tier Grab Bag features the American Zwischenfach mezzo Irene Roberts ahead of an eclectic season of Wagner.
Grand Tier Grab Bag features the American Zwischenfach mezzo Irene Roberts ahead of an eclectic season of Wagner.
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.
La Cieca will never, ever again (even if she ever had, which she didn’t so much) complain about the comments of the cher public. The comments are far and away crazier (and not in an entertaining way) elsewhere.
Look, this is a very special piece of music for me. You were twenty once, right? You were self-righteous. You had your musical heroes, and your mind was being remolded every fifteen minutes or so by a rapid succession of new experiences that challenged your notions of what music could do.
There is no cry heard more often these days than, “Where are all the Verdi sopranos?!?” Yes, there was a day when we had the likes of Aprile Millo, Eva Marton, Leontyne Price, Renata Tebaldi, Maria Callas, Leonie Rysanek, Zinka Milanov and Antonietta Stella all singing in the same, say 25 or 30 years. While…
No one, not even the company’s near-septuagenarian General Director/Wälsung, has stumbled thus far in the West Coast cycle of Wagner’s tetralogy; in fact, the only ones complaining are the handful of LaRouche protesters outside the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Of course, things are bound to heat up when mouthy heldentenor John Treleaven makes his first official…
The American mezzo-soprano and soprano is 79 years old today.
Maria Guleghina‘s Turandot on PBS right now, and, holy hell, I didn’t realize just how incredibly awful it sounded. How could anyone let such a thing be released — no, escape — on HD?
Some things, like hearing an evening of chamber music on a barge in the East River, sound better on paper than they actually are. And some things work exactly the opposite way: for example, the composer David del Tredici. Bargemusic presented soprano Courtenay Budd in a program of two song cycles from the 1990s by…
It truly is a red-letter day when La Cieca manages to propose a Regie quiz that fails to elicit from you clever pusses even a single correct guess. Last week’s opera was something of a double whammy, as it consisted of a modern piece produced in a non-traditional manner. Enough suspense: the work was Henze’s…
Talk of the Town
The Talk of the Town
Patrizia Ciofi should have made it to the Met
Patrizia Ciofi should have made it to the Met
The artist who I feel should have made it to the Met is Patrizia Ciofi.
The artist who I feel should have made it to the Met is Patrizia Ciofi.
The Talk of the Town
Giannina Arangi-Lombardi never made it to the Met
Giannina Arangi-Lombardi never made it to the Met
Giannina Arangi-Lombardi never sang at the Met.
Giannina Arangi-Lombardi never sang at the Met.
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.
Some of you may remember a few weeks ago comments veered off into a discussion of relative sizes of 19th century theaters vs. modern opera houses and, specifically, the issue of a stage apron, a playing area that extended past the proscenium into the auditorium proper, therefore allowing singers to take advantage of warmer acoustics…
Carlos Álvarez has withdrawn from the Metropolitan Opera’s January 2011 performances of Rigoletto. Veteran Verdian Leo Nucci will take on the title role for these five performances, including the Saturday broadcast.
Which singer was not unwell when he withdrew “because of illness” from that production already rife with cancellations, but rather was fired because he had not yet mastered his music?
“I’m a contrarian! We contrarians question everything! The only thing we contrarians never question is the cheques we collect for writing our silly bloody contrarian codswallop! Oh, bugger those silly toffs in their poofy frocks! Cheque, please!” [The Guardian]
“…Tony Award winners Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch have been approached to succeed Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angela Lansbury, respectively, in the roles of the captivating actress Desirée Armfeldt and her worldly-wise mother Madame Armfeldt.” [Playbill]
“The end of the world was on the program Thursday night — but for the New York Philharmonic, performing the apocalyptic opera Le Grand Macabre was a promising new beginning.” [NYP]
La Cieca has just heard from one of her habitually infallible moles that the refitting of the Met’s stages for the Robert Lepage Ring began today.
“I would only ask if there is any director who stays every day in the place he works,” Mr. Domingo said, his voice rising. [Wall Street Journal]
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