Come, young waverers
Too young to be in love. But not too young to go to war or to die.
East Coast
Unconscious coupling
Pelléas and Mélisande are not transparent to themselves. Which means: they each have an unconscious.
The servant of two last names
“In over nine years you’ve never posted an opera by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari,” no one has ever said.
Remember, darling?
During the 1970s, Stephen Sondheim composed Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Pacific Overtures and Sweeney Todd–five richly varied masterpieces of musical theater in a nearly miraculous burst of creativity.
I would they had changed voices too!
Chris’s Cache follows up its Gounod R&J installment with a widely varied quintet of additional Romeos and Juliets
New man river
Mixing the historical with the personal in strikingly original ways, Davóne Tines and Zack Winokur’s Robeson sent sparks out over the Hudson.
A happening in Central Park
The outdoor recitals that the Metropolitan Opera presents in New York City Parks every summer are a wonderful way to showcase rising young stars and promising beginners from the Met’s Lindemann Program.
Halle if ya hear me
Bergamo hosts an annual Donizetti festival, Salzburg presents a Mozart-woche every January, and of course there is Bayreuth for Wagner. But Handel gets two festivals every spring, and this year I was finally able to attend one of them.
In Napoli where love is queen
Final opera of the season. Little-known opera. A revival. So, you can probably skip it, right?
Parable of the prodigious son
I’m old enough to remember when Yannick Nézet-Séguin could do no wrong.
It may not have been echt, but it was fun!
On June 11th, the Met Orchestra returned to Carnegie Hall with a diverse program led by music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin.
Four frightened people
As an opera fanatic who was baptized by the blood of Leontyne Price, the Messa da Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi appeared on my radar fairly soon after I started delving into the operatic canon.
Thoughts on Andrea Chénier: the others
There were, of course, other Chénier recordings beyond the truly great ones…
Playing in the rafters
Opera took center stage on the final weekend of the Philadelphia Orchestra season.
Thoughts on Andrea Chénier: the greats
Quite simply, the singers are not around today who are steeped in the tradition of verismo, or for that matter the later part of the 19th century.
The age of Innocence
The score for Innocence was menacing yet comforting, and, essentially, violent and peaceful at the same time
Speaking of tradition
You can imagine my surprise at encountering an almost wholly traditional staging with one teensy difference.
Bach humbug
Peter Sellars’s rarely radical climate epic Shall We Gather at The River brought together a superb collection of musical talent for an unfortunately incoherent night of sacred song.
Thoughts on Andrea Chénier: the opera
Doing my research for these “thoughts” ahead of a starry revival in London that opened yesterday, I came across the following review for the Opening Night of the 1962-63 Season.
Try and try again
Matthew Polenzani strode into the Park Avenue Armory’s Board of Officers Room last Monday evening and was received like a beloved friend–and indeed that is what he is to many of New York’s opera-goers.
The red attachment of women
Washington National Opera’s final production of the season, seen May 22, is also its high point: a new Turandot directed by Francesca Zambello, updated to the 20th century and featuring the world premiere of a completion of Puccini’s score by composer Christopher Tin and playwright and screenwriter Susan Soon He Stanton.
Monuments man
It has been a great season for prolific Bay Area composer Jake Heggie.
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).