Janácek’s Makropulos Case has only chalked up thirteen performances in three previous runs at the Met and will have just five more this season. Try to catch at least one.
If it wasn’t anything special as art or even entertainment, Lyric Opera of Chicago’s recent production of Rinaldo (March 24) does offer an excellent peg on which to hang an argument about the future of opera in America.
Being an opera lover in Los Angeles is a lot like being a Red Sox fan. As hard as they try we never make it to the World Series, let alone the playoffs.
Oh, Rossini, Rossini! You mad, adorable fool! What power could you find in the theaters of Paris to keep you from Neapolitan arms? If you are fond of Rossini (or any other major composer), you will want to collect the whole set. Each piece of the jigsaw adds detail to the picture, but there are…
Handel’s Orlando is one of three operas Handel based on episodes from Ariosto’s best-selling sixteenth-century epic, Orlando Furioso. The story was, in 1733, well known throughout the Mediterranean world, and everyone set it to music—Vivaldi’s and Haydn’s settings have enjoyed recent revivals, and the libretto Handel set had originally been devised for Domenico Scarlatti. Intricate…
La Cieca was cced the following letter sent by a “long-time patron of NYCO” in response to “the recently received Subscription Renewal Brochure.” She has withheld the patron’s name by request.
Scanning this summer’s Mostly Mozart schedule one wondered if New York really needed another Don Giovanni right now? And one with a non-starry cast where the best-known name was the Commendatore, Kristinn Sigmundsson?
It seems a thing incredible but fifty years ago Richard Strauss was regarded as the wunderkind composer of a few tone poems, three notable operas (all produced before the First World War) and then nothing notable during forty years of repetitious senility. Even Ariadne auf Naxos, today one of the most popular works in the…
They’ve been celebrating the centennial of Gian-Carlo Menotti lately, spouting wild claims for the immortality of his music. He did have an impressive run of successes in the 1940s, but he lived till 2007 with many more premieres and nary another hit.
La Cieca’s spy attended today’s confab between George Steel (representing NYCO) and 29 singers and production personnel (AGMA) and 24 orchestra members (Local 802). The spy’s observations after the jump.
New York City Opera Education and the Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture presented an evening of discussion, poetry and music from Scott Joplin’s opera, Treemonisha last night to an overflow crowd.
AGMA has warned the agents representing Lauren Flanigan and other singers appearing in New York City Opera’s Séance on a Wet Afternoon that a work stoppage on April 30 was a virtual certainty absent the successful resolution of a new collective bargaining agreement.
In the process of unearthing forgotten musical works, sometimes we stumble across a gem. World War II saw an entire generation of European composers forced into internment or diaspora, and their works are only slowly being rescued from obscurity. In a recent DVD release from the LA Opera, a part their Recovered Voices series, we…
No programs for last night’s Fanciulla, just someone had worked overtime on the copier to give us a cast list and plot summary. If no delivery for the glossy, fully 3k people there, just slight slip and slide on the Plaza enough to keep me gripping the alpenstock. (A weapon of Individual Destruction, permitted by…
La Cieca was bcc:ed on this response from a member of the cher public to a request from the New York City Opera. With the permisssion of the author, she is publishing the note here for your discussion.
Although billed as “I Love Lucy the opera”, New York City Opera’s production of Richard Strauss’s conversation-piece Intermezzo offers far more emotional depth than the much-loved 1950s sitcom. Yet ironically, in key moments it lacks the necessary heart which Lucy had in spades.
When invited to participate in a discourse on artistic standards (hello, internet!), it’s easy — pleasurable, even — for an aesthete to bray about “the fall.” Where are the true heldentenors? Your kingdom for a Callas! (Or a Stratas, or a Rysanek!) And might the public, at long last, deserve a stable of directors who…
Squirrel was expecting boobs! People, there were no boobs, and for that, I was a little disappointed.
The day after opening the 2009-10 season with Hugo Weisgall’s Esther, New York City opera presented one of the most beloved operas in the entire repertoire, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, in a new production by Christopher Alden.
Doubling down on its artistic mission, New York City Opera begins a tenuous season with a turgid Bible drama.
Billionaire philanthropist Bruce Wayne David H. Koch, slated to be celebrated for his boons to humanity at the November 5 “American Voices” gala by the New York City Opera, is namechecked in this month’s Rolling Stone. The article, “The Lie Machine,” details how this summer’s “spontaneous” demonstrations against health care reform “were tightly orchestrated from the top down…
Today, September 12, thousands of protesters opposed to health care reform marched in Washington and elsewhere, carrying signs like the ones pictured above. This “9/12 Project” is brought to you in part by Americans for Prosperity, which you will all recall is headed by David H. Koch, the billionaire who is to be honored at…
Cher public, you may be interested or alarmed (as the case may be) to glean a little more information about the namesake of the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, home to, among others, the New York City Opera. Mr. Koch is chairman of the board of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, which finances…
La Cieca finally finished listening to her review copy of the Beverly Sills reissue Norma last night, a recording she hasn’t heard since, oh, sometime during the disco era. This is first time this recording has appeared on CD, at least in wide release, and naturally going to be of interest to Sills (or Shirley…
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.