Of course, Stemme had the character’s frenzied fury at her father’s murderers in hand, but she had far more nuance—at times this Elektra was seductive, sympathetic, loving, even humorous in her bitterness.
A 1985 broadcast of Don Giovanni featuring Cheryl Studer, Gundula Janowitz (as Elvira!), Krisztina Laki, Gösta Winbergh, Hermann Prey (in a rare outing as the Don) and Malcolm King conducted by Jeffrey Tate.
No other singer of Die Amme approaches the towering standard set by the German mezzo Tanja Ariane Baumgartner.
Alban Berg’s compact yet potent oeuvre has long played an outsized role in shaping my understanding of music’s aesthetic evolution.
Jules Massenet’s version of the Cinderella fairy tale, Cendrillon, seems to be back in vogue after many years of obscurity.
If sheer clarion vocalism is what draws you to the opera, then hie thee to Lyric Opera of Chicago’s rousing revival Of Verdi’s Il Trovatore, the oddly plotted but musically sublime opera that opened last night in the David McVicar production, originally seen in 2006.
Director David Pountney and his splendid designers have brought Lyric Opera of Chicago a visually spectacular Siegfried full of daring ideas.
“Trove Thursday” keeps the evil deeds going this All Saints’s Day with a vintage La Scala broadcast of Arrigo Boito’s only completed opera Mefistofele.
Those readers who know my musical tastes will not be shocked to find that I have a somewhat conflicted view of Mozart’s operatic works.
Lyric Opera of Chicago resumed its season on Wednesday evening with the new-to-Chicago production of Puccini’s perennial audience pleaser La bohème.
The Stars of Lyric Opera weren’t under the stars last night, prevented by a persistent cloud bank, but they nonetheless provided a stirring evening of music in Chicago’s Millennium Park.
To heck with Bayreuth and Salzburg, Glimmerglass and Santa Fe as Rosa Feola sang Mozart at Lincoln Center Friday night and I wouldn’t have been anywhere else!
August on “Trove Thursday” begins with Midsummer Mezzo Madness featuring a sterling quartet of lower-voiced ladies
“Trove Thursday” goes modest with Donizetti’s domestic comedy Don Pasquale featuring Ileana Cotrubas, Alfredo Kraus, Vicente Sardinero and Wladimiro Ganzarolli.
“Trove Thursday” turns for the third of Verdi’s four Schiller adaptations to a recent I Masnadieri with risen stars Lisette Oropesa and Russell Thomas.
Just a few years back it would have been seen as ridiculous to put “Lyric Opera of Chicago” and “Jesus Christ Superstar” in the same sentence.
Next week the Italian soprano Mariella Devia celebrates her 70th birthday so “Trove Thursday” salutes her with one of her earliest New York successes: Delibes’s Lakmé
I found Fellow Travelers intellectually and politically riveting, musically thrilling, and profoundly moving. It was a triumph.
Iestyn Davies’s theatrical blandness combined with his vocal unsuitability for the role left a hole at the center of Rinaldo.
Neumeier adapted the story close to home, making Orpheus a choreographer and his wife a star ballerina.
The production is at all times visually arresting, but it’s also extremely distracting.
It was an afternoon of spectacular singing, particularly from the two principals and the glorious Lyric Opera Chorus.
In the midst of Tosca month “Trove Thursday” assembles from the 60s to the 80s an Il Trittico in which each opera features an important Italian star.
Composer Gregory Spears is a unique example of this maxim that one must be “deeply rooted in tradition in order to innovate with integrity.”
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
×
Sign up for Parterre’s free newsletter.
Exclusive opera reviews, commentary, and top reads
delivered to your email weekly…ish.