Sextet education
My first exposure to Lucia di Lammermoor came under the auspices of The Three Stooges.
Vincenzo Bellini
69 pieces since 2005.
69
pieces
22
years
Bel canto: Is it a bop?
I need to get something off my chest. I love bel canto.
Bloody Mary, Hold the Pepper
Come ye addicts of melody! After long eclipse, Bel Canto shines again!
She’s a stranger here herself
The four leading roles in La Straniera were all attractively cast by Teatro Nuovo with fresh, promising young voices that did not seem quite ready for the big time.
Gladiator tidings
The finals on Sunday seemed a bit like the modern-day operatic equivalent of the Roman colosseum.
Giglio d’april
April brought I Puritani to Palermo’s centerpiece Teatro Massimo.
The priestess with the mostest
Edita Gruberova takes on the requirements of the title role in Bellini’s Norma.
Sì bella, sì pura, del ciel creatura
In observance of Edita’s Gruberova’s 50th anniversary in opera, I would like to offer a series of commentaries, over successive days, of my favorite performances.
Puritani, as the driven snow
It was an afternoon of spectacular singing, particularly from the two principals and the glorious Lyric Opera Chorus.
“Norma,” bis
Sir David McVicar’s inept and dreary new production of Bellini’s Norma proved to be more satisfying than it had been on opening night when it returned to the Met Friday evening thanks to its new leading ladies Angela Meade and Jamie Barton
What women want
Psychology is encoded in the composer’s vocal lines more than his librettist’s words.
Sgombra è la sacra megaplex
I suspect that David McVicar’s new production of the Metropolitan Opera’s Norma had its most congenial showing as a totality, specifically in the HD format at the movie theater.
Steal me, sweet thieves
Ali Baba ou Les Quarantes Voleurs continues straight-tone September with Teresa Stich-Randall as its heroine while Alfredo Kraus scales the heights with another Nadir.
Ladies’ Quadrille
It is much to be regretted that song recitalists stick to the tried, the true, the excessively familiar when the repertory of song is so vast, so full of treasures ready for the light
A “Juive’ for the 21st century
A brilliant production of La Juive like that of Peter Konwitschny generalizes the message that mindless hate does not pay and the mindless mob is always the enemy of civilization.
Purists
Someone—a deranged purist no doubt—heckled Javier Camarena from the balcony of the opera house for withholding the infamous high F during “Credeasi, misera.”
Diva, unfiltered
How many books have been published about Anna Maria Sofia Cecilia Kalogeropoulou Meneghini Callas, great operatic goddess of the dark arts?
Opera Syria
“The music’s fun, but doesn’t Rossini repeat himself?”
Live and empoisoned
In how many operas does the heroine drink poison and then go lengthily mad?
Roberto Devereux: Tragedy Mirrored
By the time Roberto Devereux saw its premiere at Napoli’s Teatro San Carlo on 29 October, 1837, Gaetano Donizetti had lost, in an 18-month time frame, both his parents, two still-born children, and his beloved wife Virginia.
I don’t sleep, I dream
Bellini blossomed over us like a love fest.
The rite stuff
Remember that time you went to the opera and the entire evening was perfection?
Dream girl
Whatever happened to Stefania Bonfadelli?
Star, crossed
The key to enjoying Bellini’s I Capuleti e Montechi is to do a hard factory reset and reformat your brain to forget all other works based on Romeo and Juliet.