A favorite bass performance from TildyDiva A favorite bass performance from TildyDiva

The greatest bass performance I ever experienced was actually four – four performances in four roles.

American woman American woman

Trove Thursday presents Alzira—derided by some as Verdi’s worst opera—in a 1968 Carnegie Hall concert with Gianfranco Cecchele, Louis Quilico (star of last night’s Met Rigoletto stream) and Elinor Ross, who died in March at age 93.

Dancing lady Dancing lady

I entered the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on Saturday night for LA Opera’s 30 year old revival of their production of Salome with a combination of enthusiasm and apprehension.

Red-headed woman Red-headed woman

Sills at the peak of her powers and Handel’s 1743 secular oratorio make a perfect match.

If I only had a harp If I only had a harp

Capriccio skates along on a fine line between a fascinating idea-driven debate about the purpose of art in the wider world and a rather fussy narrow debate about text and music interesting only to those interested in opera as theatre.

Blood in the water

A DVD of a 2001 Met performance of Berg’s Wozzeck is included in James Levine: Celebrating 40 Years at the Met – DVD Box Set, and it’s easy to see why this performance was chosen. Levine and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra he has done so much to build and improve are the real stars of…