The Met’s 2022 Lucia was divisive, to say the least, but it was the first time Lucia truly resonated with me.
A friend who frequents these pages recently turned me on to a Donizetti cantata that I had never heard of: his setting of the speech of Dante‘s Conte Ugolino.
From Christian martyrs to naughty fairies, Teatro Nuovo will explore the tragic and comic sides of 19th century Italian Opera.
A conversation with maestro Gil Rose of Odyssey Opera.
“Trove Thursday” goes modest with Donizetti’s domestic comedy Don Pasquale featuring Ileana Cotrubas, Alfredo Kraus, Vicente Sardinero and Wladimiro Ganzarolli.
“Trove Thursday” offers Gemma di Vergy with the lovely, largely now forgotten Adriana Maliponte in the title role.
Just when you thought it was safe to return to Rossini and Verdi—blam!
Friday’s season premiere at the Met of Donizetti’s opera about the doomed Scottish queen proved surprisingly satisfying and a genuine success for Sondra Radvanovsky.
It is, as Noel Coward remarked, astonishing how potent cheap music is. According to Brockway and Weinstock’s World of Opera, Gounod’s Faust was performed, after a rather lackluster debut in 1859, a thousand times inParis at the Opera between 1869 and 1894—a gobsmacking average of once every nine days.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
×
Sign up for Parterre’s free newsletter.
Exclusive opera reviews, commentary, and top reads
delivered to your email weekly…ish.