Curtis Opera and a charming cast of young singers cast a spell with their beguiling production of Britten‘s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Led by Yannick Nézet-Séguin and Yoann Combémorel, the Curtis Symphony Orchestra proves themselves the equal of any major American orchestra in a program of Mahler, Wagner, and Dawson.
Baritone John Brancy smoothly traverses the American songbook at Carnegie Hall.
The nail-biting adventures of Voltaire’s titular hero Candide are hardly more circuitous than those faced by Leonard Bernstein’s 1956 Broadway musical adaptation.
“What I am trying to achieve is to be what I am to the fullest. Black to the fullest, a musician to the fullest, a homosexual to the fullest.”
There was something very Russian—indeed, Chekhovian—about the mix of joy and tears, as the Academy of Vocal Arts performed Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin
American soprano Gianna Rolandi died Sunday morning, according to a number of her friends and colleagues. She was 68.
A particularly heartbreaking aspect of the pandemic shutdown has, of course, been helplessly watching rising artists have their careers plunged into indefinite silence. But for a few bold souls who are willing to try new things, the moment has also opened doors.
I’ve heard starrier performances, but none that made a more powerful case for this masterwork.
As we also saw last year, Festival O19 ended on a sweetly quiet note, movingly connecting Opera Philadelphia with the larger city and our musical future.
The chaos is nonstop, the comedy is broad and physical, and requires a large ensemble of singers who can execute Rossinian polysyllabic patter while taking pratfalls.
Opera Philadelphia’s O18 Festival continues through the weekend, but Friday represented a finale of sorts with the last two premieres.
Soprano Ashley Marie Robillard and mezzo Siena Licht Miller evoke a journey to Paris, Venice, Berlin, and London.
Kurt Weill & Bertolt Brecht’s Mahagonny Singspiel, and Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium—are not only combined, but configured to overlap in sometimes revealing, occasionally confounding ways.
I received a package in the mail this afternoon from La Cieca, and eagerly tore it open. I knew that this was to be my parterre review assignment… rapture! It was a CD of an opera: The Brothers composed by… George Antheil? Who the fuck is that? After researching him for a bit, I got…
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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