The Pennsylvania Dutchman
Verdi’s Stiffelio goes Amish in Vienna, featuring a stellar Luciano Ganci in the title role.
Plácido Domingo
218 pieces since 2006 — in 51 roles, at 24 companies, most often at Metropolitan Opera.
218
pieces
51
roles
24
companies
21
years
By role
Calaf 3
Gianni Schicchi 3
Lohengrin 3
Rodolfo 2
Pinkerton 2
Francesco Foscari 2
Don Carlos 2
Paolo 2
Dick Johnson 2
Otello 2
Hoffmann 2
Neptune 2
Alfredo 2
Loris 2
Nabucco 2
Manrico 2
Radamès 1
Papa Germont 1
Miller 1
Pollione 1
Juanillo 1
Ramerrez 1
Riccardo Percy 1
Roberto Devereux 1
Rodrigo, Marquis of Posa 1
Samson 1
Siegmund 1
Simon Boccanegra 1
Stiffelio 1
Turiddu 1
Turiddu/Canio 1
Devereux 1
Alvaro 1
Bajazet 1
Carlo 1
Cavaradossi 1
Chénier 1
Count di Luna 1
Count Maurizio 1
Cyrano 1
Des Grieux 1
Maurizio 1
Don Carlo 1
Edgardo 1
Enzo 1
Gérard; Athanaël 1
Germont Père 1
Giuliano 1
Gustavo 1
Il conte di Luna 1
Macbeth 1
By company
Metropolitan Opera 39
LA Opera 8
Los Angeles Opera 5
New York City Opera 4
San Francisco Opera 3
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden 3
Vienna State Opera 3
La Scala 3
American Opera Society 2
Royal Opera House 2
Opera Orchestra of New York 2
Washington National Opera 2
Vienna Staatsoper 1
Teatro Colón 1
Teatro alla Scala 1
Wiener Staatsoper 1
Staatsoper Hamburg 1
Staatsoper 1
Salzburger Festspiele 1
RCA 1
Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana 1
Carnegie Hall 1
Berliner Staatsoper im Schillertheater 1
Berlin Staatsoper 1
39 pieces as Metropolitan Opera — stats above show all coverage for Plácido Domingo.
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Act out, Luisa
Prompted by Washington Concert Opera’s upcoming Luisa Miller, Chris Cache’s misbehaves five times by offering just the opera’s final act with sopranos from the 1970s, some of whom might be considered “under-appreciated”: Gabriella Tucci, Adriana Maliponte, Renata Scotto, Gilda Cruz-Romo, and Katia Ricciarelli.
Consumptive professionals
Given the keen interest in recent posts of Met pirates of Montserrat Caballé in Verdi, Chris’s Cache concludes its trio with the Spanish soprano’s Met Violetta, along with additional Met in-house recordings of Virginia Zeani, Pilar Lorengar, Jeanette Pilou, and Joan Sutherland as Verdi’s doomed courtesan.
A step backwards into conventionality
On this day in 1981 the Metropolitan Opera telecast its new and unremarkable production of La traviata.
Master of monumentality
On this day in 1987 the Met raised the curtain on Franco Zeffirelli‘s production of Turandot.
Fascinating chiaroscuro
On this day in 1984, the Metropolitan Opera presented a new production of Zandonai’s Francesca da Rimini.
No minor talent
On this day in 1982 the Metropolitan Opera revisited its controversial season-opener Norma.
(Some) Thoughts on ‘Don Carlos’
In online discussion on “Favorite Opera” and cuts in opera in general, it seems Don Carlos (in its original French title) or Don Carlo (as it is better known in Italian) – with or without the “s” – generally get the most votes both as favorite and as an opera from which deplorable cuts are made.
Maria Ewing sings Mozart
Today is Mozart’s 266th birthday and I had already planned a Trove Thursday celebration when I learned that Maria Ewing had died on January 9.
Double cross
Sonya Yoncheva’s first-ever Princess Romazov was one of this summer’s casualties but Trove Thursday steps up with a rare 1960 in-house pirate of Giordano’s Fedora starring Renata Tebaldi, Giuseppe di Stefano and Tito Gobbi along with a pair of Tebaldi-di Stefano Puccini highlights from the early 1950s.
The other woman
I can’t think of an opera this year that I’ve enjoyed as much as Tuesday’s Met Macbeth, thanks especially to the smashing house debut of Italian soprano Anna Pirozzi as its blazing Madame M.
The damned don’t cry
Michael Mayer‘s production of La traviata at the Met is so timid, so devoid of insight, so cynically pandering and gaudy that I hardly feel like it even matters what I think of the performances of the current cast.
Cri du coeur
Sondra Radvanovsky returned for her 29th Met Aïda Thursday night (but only her second Aïda.)
Three more times!
The long evening didn’t achieve the degree of celebration it should have.
War horses
The proceedings took the virtue of longevity too much to heart; the night stretched on interminably.
Minnie happy returns
Puccini’s Girl closes out the 20th century and gallops into the 21st.
Do you believe in Zajick?
“Trove Thursday” gives a preview of Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila with a broadcast featuring an unexpected temptress—Dolora Zajick—who will celebrate the 30th anniversary of her Met debut next month.
Speaking ill of the dead
Plácido Domingo’s conducting reduced the score’s urgency to the lethargy of a jellyfish.
Cabal me by your name
It’s fortunate that the Met’s production of Luisa Miller featured the incomparable Piotr Beczala in the role of Rodolfo.
Ready or not, here comes mama
Opening night of La Scala in 1962 with Franco Corelli, Antonietta Stella, Fiorenza Cossotto, Ettore Bastianini, and Ivo Vinco.
Conversion narrative
Blood-and-guts singing is the reason to see Nabucco at the Metropolitan Opera this season.
Doge days
That Placido Domingo and James Levine, the Met’s inexorable septuagenarians, would team up yet again—on April Fools’ Day, no less—for a revival of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra occasioned an uncomfortable degree of doubt and dread.
Il core vi dono
With February 14th falling on a Sunday, there will be no Valentine’s Day Met performance this year.
Let me like a soldier fall
Between them, Maria Guleghina, Marcello Giordani, James Morris and John Del Carlo have nearly 150 combined years of service on stage.
Trick or trill
With help from the Met’s invaluable performance archive, here is a look back at just some of what you could have seen, and perhaps did see, on October 31st through the years at the Met.
The unanswered question
Would exciting American dramatic soprano Christine Goerke be the next great ice-princess we have been waiting for?
Three nights in Paris
“Oh to be young and going to Paris for the first time,” exclaimed an elderly gentleman who donned his best sweatervest for a concert at the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival this past August.
Isle, cry tomorrow
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.
Royal Hunt
I have been a devotee of Berlioz’s Les Troyens since I first discovered the Covent Garden recording conducted by Colin Davis.
Noble salvage
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.
A three hour tour
After today’s Met dress rehearsal of The Enchanted Island, La Cieca’s spy (pictured) reports: “You would think that if they had the entire Baroque canon to mine, they would’ve chosen music that wasn’t slow, dull, and long. In Peter Gelb‘s opening remarks, he called it ‘the Met’s Baroque Coming Out party,’ which makes me think this entire endeavor was […]
Four saints in five acts
A quintessential theater man as well as a brilliant conductor, James Levine rightfully chose not only the five-act version of Don Carlo for this 1980 performance but begins the opera as Verdi had originally conceived it. The Woodcutters chorus and the episode in which Elisabetta gives her necklace to a destitute woman are pages essential to […]
Two by two
As part of the massive CD/DVD release celebrating the 40th Anniversary of James Levine at the Met, “In Concert at the Met, 1982-83” offers generous excerpts from three memorable Gala Concerts: from February 1982, Troyanos-Domingo-Levine; from March 1982, Price-Horne-Levine; and from January 1983, Domingo-Milnes-Levine. I had the pleasure of being in the house for each […]
The People’s Courtesan
Like Liza Minnelli at the Palace or Nomi Malone in Goddess, Renée Fleming‘s Thaïs is better understood as diva event than Gesamtkunstwerk. It’s an opportunity to watch a star lady do her voodoo in a work that exists largely to showcase her glamour and appeal.
“Live” at last!
La Cieca is delighted to note that two of the best-remembered and most-coveted “Live from the Met” telecasts have at last been made available on DVD. Otello (25 September 1978) and Cavalleria rusticana/Pagliacci (5 April 1978) are now available at the Met Opera Shop and online at www.metoperashop.org, “as well as through other outlets.” La […]
placido on the down low
“In Adriana Lecouvreur, Domingo manages to portray plausibly a character young enough to be his grandson. He is the dashing Count Maurizio, who is entangled in a romantic triangle with the celebrated actress Adriana and a scheming princess. The count’s excuse for two-timing Adriana is perhaps the most original in the history of cheating. He’s […]
forty candles
Longtime friend of the ‘box Little Stevie returns to Adriana Lecouvreur: I have always believed that as with La Gioconda, a great performance of Adriana Lecouvreur needs to serve up “the four greatest singers in the world”, and the Met seems to come close to doing just that. I have attended all of the performances […]
Renata’s revenge
After more than a quarter of a century, Renata Scotto gets the last word over that silly queen who made a career of disrupting her Met performances. The DVD of the “Live from the Met” telecast of Luisa Miller was released today, and is available at Amazon.com at a 30% discount off the list price. […]
Liveblogging the Volpethon
11:40: Then Rene Pape matched Hvorostovsky, then Zajick matched (topped?) them both, then who the hell had the idiotic idea of doing the Easter Hymn with a mezzo who can’t sing it and the chorus apparently stoned or else in another city? (Oh, and did you notice the long, noisy scene change afterward? Vintage Volpe.)11:05: […]