The winners of the evening were the composer Riccardo Zandonai and Teatro Grattacielo which pulled off a near-impossible feat with success.
Pavarotti and Freni are gone but the Franco Zeffirelli Bohème remains.
When was the last time the Metropolitan Opera mounted a new production that was musically outstanding yet the direction and/or design mostly sucked?
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.
Opera is back, baby, and it’s good to be home!
For those of you keeping track at home that’s four substitutions for three roles and the curtain hasn’t even gone up yet.
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.
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!”
Luisa Miller snowballs toward disaster and death.
Saturday night, Lyric Opera of Chicago gave us a wonderful evening of vocalism in honoring Renée Fleming’s 25th anniversary at Lyric.
Sondra Radvanovsky returned for her 29th Met Aïda Thursday night (but only her second Aïda.)
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.
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.
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?
A regular day in 2018 Washington, D.C., or Verdi’s Don Carlo?
>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.
Anita Rachvelishvili and Quinn Kelsey towered over an otherwise pedestrian if still exciting Il Trovatore.
Last week, a pair of terrific recitals demonstrated what kind of intimate spell a dramatic singer can cast when left alone with a piano.
Hansel and Gretel might just be the best thing the Met has done so far this season.
Verdi’s Rigoletto returned to Lyric Opera of Chicago, a rousing performance both musically and dramatically.
Donizetti’s bel canto masterpiece Lucia di Lammermoor returned to Chicago Lyric Opera on Saturday evening.
Maria Agresta‘s delicately-acted, sumptuously-sung seamstress transformed what might have been just an average Wednesday night revival into something finer.
Newton’s Third Law of Motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
At what moment does a “rising star” become simply a “star”?
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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