That question hung in the air when Teatro de la Zarzuela Madrid revived Tomás Bretón’s opera Farinelli for first time since its premiere in 1902.
His shaved head in striking contrast to his dark beard and glinting eyes, the implacable Tartar conqueror glowers at us from the CD cover, while the uncropped photo of countertenor Xavier Sabata (above) is even more disturbing, featuring his raised fist and forearm tightly wrapped in a leather belt.
“I’ve lived with mendacity!—Why can’t you live with it? Hell, you got to live with it, there’s nothing else to live with except mendacity, is there?”
Nearly 30 years after a Handel opera last played there, Carnegie Hall presented The English Concert opening a three-year opera-oratorio project on Sunday afternoon with Radamisto.
L’incoronazione di Poppea nearly disappeared from the stage completely after its 1642 Venice premiere and a Naples revival in 1651.
Other than binging on seven or eight Agatha Christie novels in seventh grade, I can’t recall ever again reading another mystery novel, or what they now call “crime fiction.” Perhaps it’s a coincidence but around that same age I attended my first opera and began subscribing to Opera News. Hence, Commissario Guido Brunetti, hero of…
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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