Thank you for smoking
Along with Don Giovanni, Carmen is an odd bird on the list of the most beloved and frequently performed works.
Metropolitan Opera
Awakenings
There is a simple elegance to the single-composer recital album format. For the listener in the mood for, say, Puccini, it’s a chance to delve into his music without any pesky interruptions by those other guys like Verdi or Massenet. And if one is also in the mood for a particular singer’s art, then the […]
Moor than a feeling
For those of you who can’t make it to the Met’s opening night, I am happy to provide you the opportunity to experience another Otello with a cast that was unmatchable for 1981.
Money on the dresser
“Hailed ‘the Meryl Streep of opera’…” begins one sentence of a promotional piece for a Diana Damrau recording of another opera, reproduced on the soprano’s website.
A desert breeze whispering a lullaby
The studio opera recording is a rare beast these days and its arrival always a cause for celebration.
Poor wan Rusalka
The winter 2014 final run of the Met’s first/only Rusalka production (a new one is scheduled in a few seasons) seemed both a nod to the theater’s past and a hint of its future.
You stepped out of a dream
One of opera’s great “what ifs?” is what would young Erich Wolfgang Korngold have contributed to the repertoire had the likes of The Adventures of Robin Hood not beckoned him to Hollywood?
A beautiful vision
“She sounds the note of deep pathos in both action and song convincingly, and last night won the tribute of tears from many eyes.”
Superglottal
In attempting to get a little bit of everything onto my Mixcloud page, I realized that I inadvertently neglected some essentials: 1) Leyla Gencer 2) La Gioconda.
“On dirait une fleur nouvelle qui s’épanouit au matin!”
The reviews for Geraldine Farrar‘s Metropolitan Opera debut (Opening Night of the 1906-1907 season) could almost have been written by her own mother.
Everything is illuminated
Few new operas have received the near-unanimous acclaim that has greeted Written on Skin since its first performance at the 2012 Aix-en-Provence Festival.
From the depths
I was greatly anticipating Karita Mattila’s recital on Friday in Toronto’s Koerner Hall.
Long ago and Farrar away
Geraldine Farrar has gone and the Gerry-flappers are disconsolate.
The best is yet to come
The CD explosion coincided with an enormous increase in interest in HIP (historically informed performance) so now there were lots of commercial recordings of the sort of operas I had turned to pirates to find.
The reel world
It never occurred to me that each tape had to be individually dubbed or that others, maybe many, many others, might also be ordering tapes at the same time.
Chris and the pirates
Back when I was a good boy, I told my parents that my goal in getting my first job was to earn money for college; however, my real motive was to make my secret wish come true—to be able to consort with “pirates.”
Un Eden di delizia!
Let’s all listen to the American debut of Ghena Dimitrova in this 1981 performance of Ernani from Dallas.
“Confusion now hath made his masterpiece”
I have found myself truly bewildered by some of the online reviews of the Glimmerglass production of Verdi’s Macbeth.
But the Levy was dry
The redevelopment that took place at Lincoln Center during Reynold Levy’s tenure as president of Lincoln Center represents a considerable accomplishment.
Blow a kiss, take a bough
Richard Strauss’s many one-act operas make excellent concert programs, both for their length (usually under two hours) and the primary place each gives the orchestration, a specialty where Strauss’s brilliance seldom deserted him.
A life with a hero
By some quirk of fate, I tend to hear about the deaths of many operatic legends via radio news while out driving.
Something extramarital
Saturday evening conductor Will Crutchfield revived Donizetti’s La Favorite—unheard in New York for fifteen years.
È nata una stella
Few things in opera are more exciting than a beloved young singer taking on a new role, especially in a new Fach.
That sly come-hither stare
Harry Lawrence Freeman’s Voodoo, begun sometime before 1914, was completed and first heard on radio in May, 1928, then staged on Broadway later that year—seven years before Porgy and Bess, please note.
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).