23 pieces since 2015 — in 11 roles, at 11 companies, most often at Metropolitan Opera.
Following the great success of its new piece The Factotum, Lyric Opera of Chicago returned to the tried and true with the audience-pleaser Carmen in an equally tried and true 20-year old Lyric production that has stood the test of time.
“Tame” seemed to be the appropriate adjective to describe San Francisco Opera’s Carmen.
There was a certain frisson in the air entering Chicago Lyric Opera last night, and not just in anticipation of attending the world premiere of a new work by Jimmy Lopez (music) and Nilo Cruz (libretto), Bel Canto.
The Stars of Lyric Opera weren’t under the stars last night, prevented by a persistent cloud bank, but they nonetheless provided a stirring evening of music in Chicago’s Millennium Park.
Washington National Opera offered a searing production of Robert Ward’s opera The Crucible, directed by WNO Artistic Director Francesca Zambello, as the second installment in the company’s next chapter.
“Let me look around once more. Who knows when I shall see this house again?”
I’ve been waiting (nearly) 20 years for another encounter with Samuel Barber and Gian Carlo Menotti’s Vanessa.
When LA Opera finally decided to put a toe in the water and mount its first production since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, it was Igor Stravinsky‘s opera/oratorio Oedipus Rex.
I really wished to avoid joining the pig pile of derision that has fallen on SF Opera’s premiere of John Adams and Peter Sellars’ Girls of the Golden West.
I hardly know where to heap my praise first.
Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s Grammy-winning Intelligence makes a largely successful East Coast debut at Virginia Opera.
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s concert Rigoletto hits some vocal turbulence
Adela Zaharia and Amartuvshin Enkhbat shine brightly in San Francisco Opera’s opening night Rigoletto.
The Richard Tucker Foundation Gala has always been a big annual celebration of the voice with an emphasis on big-voiced singers in big repertoire (not much Wagner usually, though…). Like so many reliable operatic institutions it has struggled for survival after the pandemic.
Rigoletto is the perfect opera. The story is straightforward and powerful; none of the action occurs backstage or between scenes or twenty-seven years before curtain rise; and the ethical anvil lands not once but twice, on the title character singing, “La maledizione!” The curse!
Only connect! So sayeth E.M. Forster (via Margaret Wilcox) in Howard’s End.
A near-full house attended the Jessye Norman Memorial Celebration at the Met on Sunday afternoon, the auditorium packed with family, friends, colleagues, and fans of the late soprano, who passed away on September 30 of this year.
Friday evening’s Met premiere of Akhnaten was a resounding triumph and an outstanding testament to Philip Glass’s enduring operatic vision.
Akhnaten, seen at the Los Angeles Opera on November 13 tells the story of the Pharaoh who abandoned traditional Egyptian polytheism.
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!
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).
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