Thousands cheer
Although Gustav Mahler never wrote an opera, his colossal Eighth Symphony “The Symphony of a Thousand” may give us some glimpses of what a Mahler opera might have sounded like
Austria
This means war
Considering the size and the logistics for staging Les Troyens, every new production of Berlioz’s epic masterpiece is a special event.
Love of the earth
Claudio Abbado passed away on the 20th of January five years ago, just months before I began my Ph.D.
Brute force
Alban Berg’s compact yet potent oeuvre has long played an outsized role in shaping my understanding of music’s aesthetic evolution.
Man of the camellias
Tuesday the Met unveils its sixth new production of La Traviata since moving to Lincoln Center.
Rock out with your Tracht out
Lohengrin descended upon the Wiener Staatsoper this month like American college students to Oktoberfest: loudly, spastically, not especially coherent, and in full lederhosen and dirndls.
Santuzza in a kimono
The whole performance reminded me of what Butterfly as I have never known it, but often herad about it, can be.
Fathers’ day
How do we celebrate a long career in opera, particularly one as illustrious as Plácido Domingo‘s?
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.
Summer of the mezzo
August on “Trove Thursday” begins with Midsummer Mezzo Madness featuring a sterling quartet of lower-voiced ladies
You shall know them by their ‘Flutes’
This year’s Salzburg Festival opens Saturday with a new production of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, an opera often performed elsewhere in translation, so “Trove Thursday” offers two for the price (!) of one.
O sink hernieder, Nacht der Lenny
Well here we are, beloveds, still swathed in the warm glow of the Leonard Bernstein centennial. Box sets abound like bunnies in a hutch.
The constant nymph
The old adage “the third time’s the charm” proved to be the case with me and Daphne, Richard Strauss’s ravishing bukolische Tragödie, when I recently heard it performed by Franz Welser-Möst and the Cleveland Orchestra.
The best of everything
Munich’s Bayerische Staatsoper’s victory lap at Carnegie Hall concluded Thursday night with a sumptuous Der Rosenkavalier spectacularly conducted by Kirill Petrenko
Frau Minne
“Trove Thursday” presents a live Tristan 2 concert featuring one of my favorite dramatic sopranos. Gertrude Grob-Prandl.
Königin of Mozart
The third installment of my 50th anniversary tribute to Edita Gruberova was impossible to narrow down to one selection.
Bringing up Babylon
“Trove Valentine’s Day” further stokes Semiramis-fever with another of the celebrated works about the infamous queen: La Semiramide riconosciuta, a superb 1729 opera by Nicola Porpora.
Mit leichtem Herz und leichten Händen
Der Rosenkavalier (on Blu-ray and DVD) is from the Met HD broadcast which also happened to be the final performance of the run, becoming a true souvenir of the farewells of its two leading ladies.
Carlos at the Bat
“Trove Thursday” celebrates with Carlos Kleiber conducting Johann Strauss, Jr.’s Die Fledermaus.
Don Carlos: more or less
“Trove Thursday” presents an all-star five-act Don Carlo from forty years ago tonight.
With a song in my heart
Another five-Thursday month invites “Trove Thursday” to offer a combo of shorter works.
Untouched by an ‘Angel’
Just because one can write an opera based on a film, does this necessarily indicate that one should?
Reason to believe
I was extraordinarily happy Monday evening to encounter Angel Blue and Russell Thomas as Mimi and Rodolfo.
And the villain still pursued her
Bard College presented a semi-staged concert of Halka on Saturday evening as part of its impressively wide-ranging two-week “Chopin and his World” festival.
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).