Ilana Walder-Biesanz reports from The Santa Fe Opera, where Tobias Picker‘s latest opera falls short, a new Rodelinda scintillates, and sumptuous singing abounds across the entire repertoire.
Two of France’s leading Early Music ensembles recently visited New York City to perform music by some of the 17th century’s leading composers.
One can only pray that “three strikes, you’re out” applies at the Met. If so, we can rest easy that Jeremy Sams won’t be getting any new assignments.
As a whole, the evening seemed forced and a bit dispiriting.
For my 2014 retrospective, I’ve chosen two shows from the past year that are returning in 2015 and that really shouldn’t be missed by NY-based-and-visiting parterriani.
Notable purveyor of mayhem and infanticide Medea has lately been missing from the local operatic scene, but Sunday afternoon sections of the recently renovated Alice Tully Hall were singed by Canadian soprano Dominique Labelle’s blazing incarnation of the Greek sorceress.
In recent years the enterprising Dell’Arte Opera Ensemble has brightened the usually arid weeks of August in New York City with some worthy operatic showcases for young singers.
I completely missed The Enchanted Island during the Met’s 2011-12 season, both in the house and in the HD presentation. Even on Sirius, I had only heard snippets of the performance.
The Poisoned Kiss derives its plot from the legend of the girl raised on poison so that her very kiss will kill.
The New Year’s Eve gala at the Met ushering out 2011 was the world premiere of the much-anticipated mash-up The Enchanted Island AKA “baroque opera for those who hate (or at least don’t know) baroque opera.
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.
I half-wanted to dislike it; my expectations were very low. Renée Fleming in the Baroque, after her very uncertain recent outings in bel canto! Let’s face it; this year, her Rossini (Armida) and Donizetti (Lucrezia Borgia) did not cover her in glory. How, at this HD relay on December 3, would she cope with Handel’s…
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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