Beyond the wail
Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci at Lyric Opera of Chicago are hysterical in all the wrong ways.
Quinn Kelsey
48 pieces since 2013 — in 19 roles, at 9 companies, most often at Metropolitan Opera.
48
pieces
19
roles
9
companies
14
years
By role
Role Alfio
Role Amonasro
Can you dig it?
I had been hopeful that 2024 would end, if not on a high note, then one that was at least in tune.
Cri du coeur
Sondra Radvanovsky returned for her 29th Met Aïda Thursday night (but only her second Aïda.)
Mortal raises veil from before goddess’s face
Anna Netrebko is the greatest performing artist singing opera today. Nobody else comes close; she makes me love her in a way that verges on the erotic.
Role Bacchus
A barrel of laughs
Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer‘s bubbly The Judgement of Paris brings a distinctly Californian terroir to operatic comedy.
Role baritone in Thais duet
Silver lining
Saturday night, Lyric Opera of Chicago gave us a wonderful evening of vocalism in honoring Renée Fleming’s 25th anniversary at Lyric.
Role Der Geisterbote
Afraid of their own shadows
Later this month the Met at last revives its striking Herbert Wernicke production of Die Frau ohne Schatten, prompting a Chris’s Cache preview of three live recordings of Strauss and Hofmannsthal’s fanciful if knotty masterpiece.
Role di Luna
The trouble with troubadours
Anita Rachvelishvili and Quinn Kelsey towered over an otherwise pedestrian if still exciting Il Trovatore.
Role Don Carlo
Power and precision: ‘Ernani’ in Chicago
LOC’s Ernani is a satisfying evening of Verdi sung by four stars at the height of their powers.
Role Enrico
Madness on the moors!
The new cast at the Met suggested an alliterative retitling of Lucia di Lammermoor was needed—perhaps Lost Loonies in Love or its Italian equivalent?
‘Tis new to thee
Donizetti’s bel canto masterpiece Lucia di Lammermoor returned to Chicago Lyric Opera on Saturday evening.
Role Germont
Flawless!
At the Metropolitan Opera on Friday night, an otherwise undistinguished Traviata was salvaged by an astonishing performance from Aleksandra Kurzak, whose Violetta was an incontrovertible triumph.
Shrieking violet
Diana Damrau‘s performance as Violetta was the work of a very ordinary artist, one susceptible to vocal flubs, poor intonation, and an all too banal approach operatic performance.
Wish upon a star
At what moment does a “rising star” become simply a “star”?
Lost and found
Verdi must have gotten tired of tossing and turning by now and has gone back to resting in peace.
Role Marcello
Distinctly human
In the five short years that I’ve been in New York, I have seen that crusty old Franco Zeffirelli production of La bohème more times than I can count on one hand. And there are certainly times when that peeling mise-en-scène really shows its age.
Give Paris one more chance
Pavarotti and Freni are gone but the Franco Zeffirelli Bohème remains.
Queen of the New Year
Although the gold glitter cannons detonated at the end of the act were an ostentatious reminder that this was a celebration of the new year, it seemed that the only words on anyone’s lips as the audience filed out of the theater were “Viva Netrebko!”
Embroidered silk
Maria Agresta‘s delicately-acted, sumptuously-sung seamstress transformed what might have been just an average Wednesday night revival into something finer.
Role Miller
The Wurm turns
Luisa Miller snowballs toward disaster and death.
Role Peter
Hell’s kitchen
Hansel and Gretel might just be the best thing the Met has done so far this season.
Role Renato
Cuck and ball torture
On October 20th, a wet but warmish Friday night, the Metropolitan Opera opened this season’s revival of Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera in David Alden’s 2012 production.
Role Rigoletto
A game of hoarse
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s concert Rigoletto hits some vocal turbulence
Violent delights
Some people were introduced to the art form listening to the Met’s NBC broadcasts on a glowing tube radio or watching acid-trip animated adaptations on the BBC or seeing Elmer Fudd sing, “Kill the Wabbit.” I came to opera through simulated drive-by shootings soundtracked by The Marriage of Figaro.
Tucker and roll
The Richard Tucker Foundation Gala has always been a big annual celebration of the voice with an emphasis on big-voiced singers in big repertoire (not much Wagner usually, though…). Like so many reliable operatic institutions it has struggled for survival after the pandemic.
The clown of God
Rigoletto is the perfect opera. The story is straightforward and powerful; none of the action occurs backstage or between scenes or twenty-seven years before curtain rise; and the ethical anvil lands not once but twice, on the title character singing, “La maledizione!” The curse!
Romantic hero
The main reason to see this revival is Benjamin Bernheim’s Duca.
Romeo and Gilda
The winners of the evening were the composer Riccardo Zandonai and Teatro Grattacielo which pulled off a near-impossible feat with success.
Back to black
When was the last time the Metropolitan Opera mounted a new production that was musically outstanding yet the direction and/or design mostly sucked?
Any old palace
At the heart of this success was Quinn Kelsey’s revelatory take on Rigoletto. He was matched, vocally and dramatically, by Rosa Feola’s Gilda—a tour-de-force performance.
Plus a little jest
Verdi’s Rigoletto returned to Lyric Opera of Chicago, a rousing performance both musically and dramatically.
Role Roberto Devereux
Roberto dangerously
For those of you keeping track at home that’s four substitutions for three roles and the curtain hasn’t even gone up yet.
Role Rodrigo
Family values
A regular day in 2018 Washington, D.C., or Verdi’s Don Carlo?
The girl next door
>Verdi’s marvelous yet neglected Luisa Miller finally returns to the Met later this month after an absence of a dozen years so “Trove Thursday” provides a preview.
Role Scarpia
On an evening in Roma
After an uneven gala performance of Tosca on Tuesday, I’m not sure what the Met means by “celebrating Puccini.”
The ‘Drama’ you’ve been craving
Opera is back, baby, and it’s good to be home!
Role Sharpless
Cavalcade of stars
Back-to-back casts in the Metropolitan Opera’s revivals of Madama Butterfly and La traviata offer ample opportunity for soprano-gazing.
Role Simon Boccanegra
Dogecoin
In sum: not a perfect Simon Boccanegra—is there such a thing?—but a grand and often great one.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
