Five characters in search of an interpreter
In Lise Davidsen‘s new album Lise Davidsen: Verdi, which drops tomorrow, the singing is thrilling but the interpretations are limp.
Edward Gardner
14 pieces since 2010 — at 6 companies, most often at English National Opera.
14
pieces
6
companies
17
years
Married to the mob
Contrasting approaches to Regie duke it out in Cavalleria rusticana & Pagliacci and Rusalka in Munich
Fjord every stream
Lise Davidsen‘s singular Senta dominates the forces of the Norwegian National Opera in a roiling new recording of Der fliegende Holländer out now on Decca Classics
I had too much to dream last night
Trove Thursday previews next week’s BBC Proms presentation of Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius with a 2008 broadcast conducted by Colin Davis with Sarah Connolly, Ben Heppner and Gerald Finley.
Chanson d’amour
Soprano Erin Wall died in early October, a month shy of her 45th birthday; Trove Thursday remembers her with a 2012 broadcast of Kaija Saariaho’s shimmering L’Amour de Loin.
Faust class
Michael Spyres as Faust, despite a few flickers of indisposition, was nearly ideal.
Keeper of the flame
Elina Garanca’s glorious Marguerite transformed La Damnation de Faust into the Met’s first essential must-see of the year.
Speed kills
Minnesota Opera’s stab at boosting revenue with extra performances of something surefire never caught fire.
Thousands cheer
Although Gustav Mahler never wrote an opera, his colossal Eighth Symphony “The Symphony of a Thousand” may give us some glimpses of what a Mahler opera might have sounded like
Crazy in love
I am, perhaps instinctively, skeptical of those who commit suicide.
Sweetness and light
This was a Rosenkavalier that aspired to excellence and almost achieved it.
Crown jewel
I’m a long-time fan of the Opera in English series funded by The Peter Moores Foundation that started, fittingly enough, with conductor Reginald Goodall’s performances of Wagner’s Ring cycle recorded live from the London Coliseum and released by EMI
Fatal attraction
Benjamin Britten’s final opera Death in Venice, based on Thomas Mann’s 1912 novella, is given a lush and quite beautiful production from stage director Deborah Warner for the English National Opera.
What really happened at Bly?
Necrophiliac pedophilia? Or a slow descent into madness? What really happened at Bly? After listening to Glyndebourne’s 2007 Production of Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw, released in a live recording under the festival’s own label, one is still left in the dark as to what really transpired at that English estate. Perhaps this […]
Praise the Lord!
Okay, it wasn’t Sister Act all the way, but in the middle of Acts IV and V, ENO’s new production of Gounod’s Faust (September 18) almost turned me into a straight Catholic Republican conservative. But we’ll get to the reason why a bit later.
Batter my disc
I have heard Gerald Finley live and enjoyed his singing immensely. He possesses a strong, resonant, lyric baritone, even of scale and beautiful of timbre. His biggest successes to date have been creating the roles of Oppenheimer in John Adams‘ Dr. Atomic and Harry in Mark-Anthony Turnage‘s The Silver Tassie. He includes selections from both […]
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
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).
