Deine Divadienste will die Frau
I wish to introduce our younger Parterrians to the magical Martha Mödl to commemorate the opening of the Bayreuther Festspiele which opens tomorrow afternoon.
Bregenzer Festspiele
Theory of revolution
Jonas Kaufmann announced that he feels ready to return to the stage after calling in sick since last autumn
Beyond the forest
Mimìs, Violettas, and Cio-Cio-Sans may live, love, and meet their ends without a tear from me, but I have never left a performance of Janácek’s The Cunning Little Vixen dry-eyed.
‘Tale’ of the unexpected
I am happy to finally add Les contes d’Hoffmann to the playlist in a Salzburg performance from 2003 with Neil Shicoff in one of his parade roles.
Crime of “Passion”
Bohuslav Martinu’s The Greek Passion has had a rough life.
Lake, placid
Having recently reviewed Glass’s The Perfect American on this site and participated in spirited discussions about the film Saving Mr. Banks, it is perhaps not surprising that Walt Disney should spring to my mind as I watched the Unitel Classica video
of Die Zauberflote from the floating stage of the Bregenzer Festspiele.
Mist opportunity
The story is enough of a cipher to make any regie-bent director salivate.
Cult favorite
The relative obscurity of Karol Szymanowski‘s Krol Roger (King Roger, 1924) can only be blamed on its being in Polish. The music is often as thrilling as anything by Janácek or Bartók, and the libretto by Jaroslow Iwaszkiewicz (heavily adapted by the composer) is as full of provocative philosophical ideas as operas by those composers […]
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).