San Francisco goes baroque with performances of Handel‘s Alcina, Tolomeo, and Rinaldo.
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, leading the Met Orchestra, and Joyce DiDonato continue their exploration of Mahler at Carnegie Hall.
Christopher Corwin and Andrew Lokay provide dual perspectives on the National Symphony Orchestra‘s performances of Puccini’s triple-bill.
Kaija Saariaho’s spectral, shattering Innocence makes its Metropolitan Opera debut.
William Guanbo Su and Ann Hallenberg are compelling in The English Concert’s presentation of Handel‘s Hercules at Carnegie Hall.
David Fox and Dan Johnson report on Yannick Nézet-Seguin‘s recent performances of Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in Philadelphia and New York.
Baritone John Brancy smoothly traverses the American songbook at Carnegie Hall.
Joyce DiDonato makes the most of Kevin Puts‘s trite new Emily Dickinson monodrama.
A high-drama Vanessa by the Boston Symphony Orchestra offers something to believe in.
The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra offered a rending reading of Britten‘s massive War Requiem with an eclectic trio of soloists.
Nobody emotes like Joyce DiDonato, and this week Parterre Box spotlights her new recording of Dido and Aeneas with a look at a recent live performance in the part.
For our first review in a new series, we turn to the new recording of Dido and Aeneas featuring Joyce DiDonato, Michael Spyres and Maxim Emelyanychev leading Il Pomo d’Oro.
When I first encountered Joyce DiDonato in the early 2000s, I found her to be the case of an extraordinary technique and intelligent artistry supporting a rather ordinary voice.
I’m convinced that someone else will claim this Donizetti opera before I do, but Maria Stuarda is definitely my very favorite Donizetti opera.
When the birthdays start to pile up in the double digits in big round numbers, you start to examine your past and review what you have done with your life.
Maximalism was on the menu last weekend at the Philadelphia Orchestra.
Needing a Mozart palate-cleanser after the recent misbegotten Marriage of Figaro, I went back more than two decades for a Houston Così fan Tutte featuring then-rising Americans Christine Goerke, Joyce Di Donato, Richard Croft, and Nathan Gunn as the confused lovers.
Too young to be in love. But not too young to go to war or to die.
In its first go-around in November 2022, Kevin Puts’s The Hours (libretto by Greg Pierce based on the novel by Michael Cunningham and the screenplay for the Stephen Daldry’s 2002 film was a box office bullseye for the Metropolitan Opera.
I watched the finals for this year’s George and Nora London Foundation competition and would like to offer, if not a traditional review, a brief roundup of who I found exceptionally watchable and whom I think you, dear parterre boxers, should watch out for in the next few years.
A convocation of mezzos–and a pride of tenors–produce hundreds of sixteenth notes in a bewitching Rossini showpiece
“None of that sentimental crap, okay?”
A stack of noteworthy recent baroque vocal CDs on my desk has been staring at me for weeks, so I’m tackling them on Handel’s birthday before the Met roars back into action beginning this weekend.
On this day in 1937 soprano Bidu Sayão made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Manon.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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