While it may not be top-tier Rossini, Teatro Nuovo’s mounting of Il turco in Italia is still good summer fun.
An exciting cast digs their claws into a heady production of La Calisto at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
An excellent Věc Makropulos at Opéra de Lille makes the case for the vitality and necessity of France’s regional companies.
Marina Rebeka comes tantalizingly close to triumph in Cherubini’s Médée at Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
“When there’s so much to get right, unsurprisingly a lot can and, as we all know, does go wrong.”
Fine music-making meets a clunker of a production in La Monnaie‘s revival of Norma
Offenbach‘s Robinson Crusoé is salvaged from obscurity.
Krzysztof Warlikowski‘s Der Rosenkavalier at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées surpasses even Nigel Wilkinson‘s high ‘WTF threshhold’
Even if our monolingual American tourists can be the source of vexation for many a Parisian, our singers gave much for the city’s operagoers to admire this month in stylish productions of Semele at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and I Puritani at the Opéra Bastille.
Florian Leopold Gassmann’s delicious romp L’Opera Seria seems the perfect New Year’s Eve choice at Chris’s Cache
Two short theatrical works and one sacred piece from the beguiling oeuvre of the guy who didn’t write Louise
For anyone who thought that Downton Abbey, with its plot lines divided between the gentry and their faithful (or not-so) servants was somehow unique, that particular tale, and lo its many variations, has been told in one form or another since Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais put quill to paper in 1778 with La Folle Journée, ou Le Mariage de Figaro.
No one who followed Trove Thursday will be surprised that Diva November on Chris’s Cache today features Ann Hallenberg and Sandrine Piau.
“The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays” – Soren Kierkegaard
The always elegant Véronique Gens has recently returned often to her earliest roots in the French baroque.
The Met’s recent Ariadne auf Naxos and Elektra combo left me wanting more and more Richard Strauss, so Trove Thursday offers a complete Capriccio with Jonas Kaufmann (his one-and-only Flamand) and Christopher Maltman vying for Soile Isokoski.
Trove Thursday celebrates Pride with a Bible-based homoerotic sort-of opera not by the guy who wrote “Depuis le jour”: Charpentier’s David et Jonathas with Mark Padmore, Laurent Naouri and Jaël Azzaretti led by Emmanuelle Haïm.
While seasonally-awkward streams of Messiah abound, Trove Thursday turns instead to Berlioz’s exquisite L’Enfance du Christ from francophone forces including Stéphanie d’ Oustrac, Bernard Richter, Edwin Crossley-Mercer and Nicolas Testé (for once, sans sa femme).
Although I usually pretend that I don’t have the diva-worship gene, sharp-eyed readers of parterre box will know that since I joined the site in 2011 as “DeCaffarrelli” I have often swooned as an Ann Hallenberg-fanboi.
A brace of Handel operas at the George Enescu International Festival.
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.
August on “Trove Thursday” begins with Midsummer Mezzo Madness featuring a sterling quartet of lower-voiced ladies
While one sympathized with Matthew Aucoin’s urge to add his voice to the Orpheus canon it was difficult to figure out how his work complemented Gluck’s.
Scheming Anne-Sofie von Otter offs her brother and sons before the opera even begins? You bet!
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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