218 pieces since 2006 — in 51 roles, at 24 companies, most often at Metropolitan Opera.
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.
On this day in 1981 the Metropolitan Opera telecast its new and unremarkable production of La traviata.
As said at the beginning, I implied I’d rather see Don Carlo(s) and listen to Forza.
Vocal glamour in abundance highlighted the opening performance of LA Opera’s Il barbiere di Siviglia on November 29 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion, with much buzz attendant on the company debuts of Rossini experts Juan Diego Flórez and Joyce DiDonato. Adding excitement was the Figaro of Nathan Gunn, who played with Errol Flynn panache, and […]
In the lead up to LA Opera’s mounting of Turandot on May 18th (hooray!) I thought I’d touch on some of my favorite recordings and new re-masters I’ve discovered. I have them all.
On this day in 1987 the Met raised the curtain on Franco Zeffirelli‘s production of Turandot.
Would exciting American dramatic soprano Christine Goerke be the next great ice-princess we have been waiting for?
La Cieca assumes, or at least hopes, such an encounter is currently taking place on some other plane. In slightly more mundane terms, though, Mike Richter did “meet” Claudio Abbado, though not in the context of his celebrated CD-ROM series.
Andrea Andermann is the veteran film producer who had the notion to assemble top-flight talent from the worlds of music and cinema for a generously funded film of Tosca.
There were, of course, other Chénier recordings beyond the truly great ones…
The role debut of a world-class singer is always a time of great anticipation, hopefully to be followed by celebration, if not unbridled jubilation.
“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 […]
The indisputable star of the new Naxos DVD of Franco Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac, filmed at the Palau de les Arts ‘Reina Sofia’ in Valencia and directed by Michal Znaniecki, is, as in all other stage, operatic and film adaptations of the Cyrano story, the enormous prosthetic nose worn by the title character. The nose […]
Those of you cher public who ordered and enjoyed Decca’s bargain Wagner box may now be interested in a bargain Puccini edition offered by EMI. The set, Puccini: The Operas, retails for $59.98 (less than four bucks a disc) and includes complete performances of:Â
Now we find Mariella Devia, a diva held in near mythic regard due to her vocal longevity, with competing videos of two of her performances that were released, literally, on the same day.
Giacomo Puccini’s La fanciulla del West may have its detractors (Stravinsky referred to it as a “horse-opera’) but you will not find me among them.
Giacomo Puccini’s horse-opera version of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” La Fanciulla del West, based on David Belasco’s play, The Girl of the Golden West, enjoyed the status of a curate’s egg for quite a while.
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 […]
In any case, we are now in the Queen’s garden of the Palace in Madrid. It is the day before the coronation of King Philip. Coronation? What coronation?
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.
With La Scala’s plan to open on December 7 with a new Lucia di Lammermoor thwarted, Trove Thursday sets its Wayback Machine to nearly 50 years ago to present two of the 20th century’s greatest madwomen—Joan Sutherland and Beverly Sills—denounced by Plàcido Domingo and Alfredo Kraus respectively, with the former pair consoled by Kurt Moll‘s luxurious Raimundo.
Yes, there were other Giocondas if not of quite the same distinction. Chronologically…
The second DVD/Blu-ray with Plácido Domingo as Verdi’s other beleaguered Doge, Francesco in I due Foscari.
“Take a good deal of trouble with it, because it is a fine subject, delicate and full of pathos.”
Anticipation of events like the Metropolitan Opera’s 50th Anniversary bash turns me back into the newly opera-soused kid who begged his parents to let him watch the highlights of the Bing Gala on the family color television.
On a new Opus Arte video, Ermonela Jaho is at the absolute peak of her powers both vocally and interpretively.
The long evening didn’t achieve the degree of celebration it should have.
Sometimes when you find the club that will have you as a member, you do not easily give up your spot.
LA Opera opened their 30th season with a pairing of two of their most popular productions, both of which were initially staged by filmmakers not unfamiliar with the vagaries of our industry outpost here in Hollywoodland.
An ambitious and Wagner-smitten Ruggero Leoncavallo wrote his rarely heard opera I Medici (Historical Action in Four Acts) as the beginning of what he planned as “an epic poem in the form of a historical trilogy.” Taking his lead from the Ring, Leoncavallo called his planned trilogy Crepesculum, an homage to the Italian translation of […]
A 1989 production of Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera should have been another jewel in Herbert von Karajan’s already quite impressive crown. A stellar cast, an impeccable orchestra, an enormous period set –the grand opera of Salzburg under his regime. He had recently finished a studio recording with the cast, and was preparing them for […]
When my editor suggested to me a round-up of my favorite recordings of Jacques Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann I was très, très, intrigued.
No amount of scholarly diligence has kept Les contes d’Hoffmann from being the messiest of all standard-repertory messes.
This week, Our Own Jungfer Marianne Leizmetzerin turns her vigilant ears to the recent past to take in a performance of Il trovatore featuring Anna Netrebko and Plácido Domingo.
As you can imagine, oaths are sworn, curses are flung with avidity, and a mysterious shepherd sings a tune of foreboding from a distant mountain gorge just when you’d expect it.
This week “Trove Thursday” brings a rare in-house recording of a visit to the Metropolitan Opera House by the Staatsoper Hamburg presenting Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress with a deluxe cast
Richard Wagner believed the key to any legend was contrasting the supernatural with human nature, and showing how the combination had no chance of enduring. In Lohengrin, the title’s character’s insistence on unconditional love and trust collide with the conditional expectations of the real world. The challenge is capturing the tale’s somber majesty without losing […]
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.
It was while attending a performance of Fédora in Naples in 1885 that eighteen year-old Umberto Giordano fell in love with Sardou’s then immensely popular play; the protagonist was none other than Sarah Bernhardt, the creator of the title role. He immediately asked the French dramatist to sell him the rights, a request Sardou did […]
The characters get right down to work immediately with their foul deeds.
The air held a real charge that night in SF’s War Memorial Opera House.
Opening night of La Scala in 1962 with Franco Corelli, Antonietta Stella, Fiorenza Cossotto, Ettore Bastianini, and Ivo Vinco.
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 […]
It’s fortunate that the Met’s production of Luisa Miller featured the incomparable Piotr Beczala in the role of Rodolfo.
What if you could time travel back to the first run of Giuseppe Verdi’s first great success Nabucco?
Blood-and-guts singing is the reason to see Nabucco at the Metropolitan Opera this season.
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.
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.
Gabriela Benacková, one of Trove Thursday’s favorite sopranos, turns 75 tomorrow, so we celebrate with two rare complete Verdi portrayals.
For those of you who can’t make it to the Met’s opening night, I am happy to provide you the opportunity to experience another Otello with a cast that was unmatchable for 1981.
Inspired by Harry Rose’s recent fine polemic about verismo performance practice, Chris’s Cache offers one of Opera Orchestra of New York’s most exciting evenings: Zandonai’s Francesda da Rimini from 1973 with Raina Kabaivanska, Placido Domingo, and Matteo Manuguerra.
On this day in 1984, the Metropolitan Opera presented a new production of Zandonai’s Francesca da Rimini.
“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.
Today’s Trove Thursday was originally scheduled for February 27, which would have been Mirella Freni’s 85th birthday, but instead we remember today the beloved soprano who passed away this past weekend in Puccini.
It seems almost comical to think now but the designer-director Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, who died in 1988, was at one time considered the height of regie-theatre scandal.
On this day in 1982 the Metropolitan Opera revisited its controversial season-opener Norma.
When I was a fledgling opera enthusiast, professors at a small-town Wisconsin college routinely travelled to Chicago for Lyric Opera performances.
Puccini’s Girl closes out the 20th century and gallops into the 21st.
The American Opera Society introduced many important singers to New York City audiences, but few were as controversial as the Greek soprano Elena Souliotis; Trove Thursday offers her local debut (at age 23) in Anna Bolena with Marilyn Horne, Janet Baker, Plácido Domingo and Carlo Cava.
Our own Jungfer Marianne Leitmetzerin delves back into those days when there was another opera company in New York, and (what’s more) the opera done there was worth hearing.
The Solti recording of Bohème is completely miscast.
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.
For opening night of the new LA Opera season Placido Domingo decided to return to one of his best Verdi showcases, Don Carlo, only this time as the baritone, Rodrigo the Marquis di Posa, instead of the title character.
Shirley Verrett remains one of my all-time favorite artists, and I am pleased to introduce her to my Mixcloud site in one of her parade roles: the femme fatale in Saint-Saëns’ Samson et Dalila.
I still remember, and some of it quite vividly, what it was like to experience Achim Freyer‘s intense and groundbreaking Ring production all these years later.
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.
Verdi’s Stiffelio goes Amish in Vienna, featuring a stellar Luciano Ganci in the title role.
Chris’s Cache celebrates an “Easter in October” gala with five special pirate recordings of Cavalleria Rusticana from the Met featuring four prima donnas whose Santuzze never got a Saturday broadcast and one whose did: Giulietta Simionato, Fiorenza Cossotto, Régine Crespin, Rita Hunter and Mignon Dunn.
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 […]
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