The world is your balloon
If it wasn’t anything special as art or even entertainment, Lyric Opera of Chicago’s recent production of Rinaldo (March 24) does offer an excellent peg on which to hang an argument about the future of opera in America.
Elza van den Heever
27 pieces since 2012 — in 17 roles, at 6 companies, most often at Metropolitan Opera.
27
pieces
17
roles
6
companies
15
years
By role
Role Armida
Role Chrysothemis
Sister, sister, oh so fair
Conductor Eun Sun Kim and soprano Elza van der Heever play to their strengths in a piercing revival of Elektra at San Francisco Opera.
Revenge served cold
Of course, Stemme had the character’s frenzied fury at her father’s murderers in hand, but she had far more nuance—at times this Elektra was seductive, sympathetic, loving, even humorous in her bitterness.
The mania event
Christine Goerke‘s puzzling high register has become an increasingly troubling aspect of her singing. One just never knew what was going to come out from one moment to the next.
Role Elettra
Sea no evil
A muted production challenges a talented cast in San Francisco Opera’s Idomeneo
Role Elisabeth
Christian science monitored
In any case, we probably got as good a Tannhäuser cast as could be assembled these days.
Role Elisabetta
Queen for a D
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.
Role Elizabeth
Red queen
Joyce DiDonato is taking her Mary Stuart on the road, so to speak.
Role Elizabeth I
Wigs and weaves
It’s easiest to write reviews when there are soaring triumphs and miserable failures.
Role Elsa
Rock out with your Tracht out
Lohengrin descended upon the Wiener Staatsoper this month like American college students to Oktoberfest: loudly, spastically, not especially coherent, and in full lederhosen and dirndls.
Role Empress
Trick mirror
A recent conversation with a friend who has loved Die Frau ohne Schatten for twice as long as I have been alive revealed that we both had some unresolved questions about the plot.
Role Fidelio
The big cube
Ludwig van Beethoven’s “rescue opera” Fidelio was presented by San Francisco Opera as their first new production of the season last Thursday in reinterpreted fashion.
Role Leonore
Wer ein solches Weib errungen
Opera at Caramoor rallied Sunday afternoon with an admirable if erratic performance of Fidelio which was especially memorable for South African soprano Elza van den Heever’s thrilling first-ever Leonore.
Role Marie
Every snarl and shimmer
Yannick Nézet-Séguin and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra reigned supreme at the opening night of Wozzeck on Friday evening, rendering every snarl and shimmer of Berg’s score with gripping intensity.
Role Rodelinda
Seria effect
While it must be admitted that Elza van den Heever doesn’t have an ideally warm and agile Handel voice, she evidenced fierce control over her instrument and skillfully built a powerful portrait of the courageous Rodelida fighting for her survival.
Role Salome
Little girls get bigger every day
Elza van den Heever and Peter Mattei (and the stage elevator) elevate an assertive, if not definitive, new Salome at the Met
Coups de theatre
This month, both the Paris Opéra and the Opéra-Comique are mounting seminal works about unhinged anti-heroines who meet their downfall after falling head-over-heels for an unavailable, deeply unattainable man – Salome, in the case of the Opéra; and Armide, in the case of the Opéra-Comique.
Role Senta
Die Frist ist Glum
This Holländer offers neither a clear narrative vision for the work nor a sense of turbocharged drama; it simply sits on the Met’s cavernous stage as a dull gray mass.
Role Sieglinde
Get in the zone
Tamara Wilson and Stanislas de Barbeyrac are the standouts in Calixto Bieito’s underwhelming Die Walküre in Paris
Role Vitellia
Why so seria?
At the Metropolitan Opera on Saturday night, Mozart’s opera never sounded fresher, a superstar cast shining new light on one of the composer’s all-too-seldom-performed scores.
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).
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!
