Back in black
He returned. He sang. He didn’t get hanged.
James Creswell
8 pieces since 2017 — in 8 roles, at 3 companies, most often at San Francisco Opera.
8
pieces
8
roles
3
companies
10
years
Role Ashby
Role Bartolo
Take care of this house
How does one make a performance of standard opera repertoire like Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro feel “fresh?”
Role Comte de Grieux
The pleasure of her company
It is not easy for an opera company to follow a spectacular production of La Traviata with Massenet’s Manon.
Role Friar Lawrence
Get this Pati started
Politics and romance entangled in a spectacular fashion at San Francisco Operas’s Roméo et Juliette.
Role Publio
Take the long way Rome
Russell Thomas’s opening aria, “Del piu sublime soglio” displayed an intense attention to the text and some surprisingly beautiful piano phrasing that I’ve never heard risked before and it brought wonder and gooseflesh.
Role Rocco
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 Trulove
Varying the song
The opera The Rake’s Progress, as many people know already, was inspired by a series of engravings and paintings of the same name by William Hogarth, showing the decline of a young man into depravity and insanity.
Role Vodník
Empty chairs
The fourth production of Santa Fe Opera’s 66th Festival Season that opened on Saturday June 22 offered a multitude of firsts.