A masked ball
Opera San José (OSJ) concluded its eclectic 41st Season with another first, Héctor Armienta’s Zorro, which received its Northern California premiere at the California Theatre on Friday, April 19th.
West Coast
Loving him isn’t the right thing to do
Matthew Travisano takes on Mimì’s Act III aria from La bohème — not that one, the other one — in the latest installment of the “Perspectives on an Aria” series
Blue Saturday
A grand concert from Angel Blue has Patrick Mack wondering, “where’s her crossover album?”
Yes and no
William Kentridge‘s eclectic The Great Yes, The Great No arrives at Cal Performances.
The Women are like that
A stylish and funny Così fan tutte at LA Opera is a pretty glam affair, according to Patrick Mack.
Birds of a feather
In Opera Parallèle’s The Pigeon Keeper, Michael Anthonio finds a timely message of kindness during hard times.
Avant de quitter la scène
As of late, the Bay Area has been blessed with a few high-wattage, high-profile recitals as if to compensate for the chilly temperatures and gloomy weather. Roughly a month after Lise Davidsen made an ebullient debut at Cal Performances, the Bay Area welcomed French soprano Natalie Dessay last Saturday.
Another op’nin’, another show
Opera San José (OSJ) is continuing the second half of its 41st season with a company premiere of Béla Bartók’s Symbolist opera Bluebeard’s Castle (A kékszakállú herceg vára), with a libretto by his friend and poet Béla Balázs, and OSJ truly spared no effort to make the occasion a memorable one.
Look to the western sky
Not even howling winds and thunderous rain could dampen the excitement of Bay Area audiences to experience Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen for the first time in the Bay Area at Zellerbach Hall Berkeley last Tuesday, 4 February.
San Francisco Opera 2025-26
The San Francisco Opera announces its 2025-26 season.
It takes a woman
The plight of two women, each from different backgrounds, was on full display in San Francisco opera houses last week.
Mixte blessings
I was just moderately excited when LA Opera announced that French tenor Benjamin Bernheim would be coming to concertize at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, 90210.
My Verona
It surprises even me how some operas have eluded me in live performance even after lo, these many years. One of them is Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette.
It’s Brittany, bitch
Sparks flew when the San Francisco Opera opened their new production of Richard Wagner’s monumental Tristan und Isolde on Saturday, October 19th, at the War Memorial Opera House.
Easter vigilantes
Chris’s Cache celebrates an “Easter in October” gala with five special pirate recordings of Cavalleria Rusticana from the Met featuring four prima donnas whose Santuzze never got a Saturday broadcast and one whose did: Giulietta Simionato, Fiorenza Cossotto, Régine Crespin, Rita Hunter and Mignon Dunn.
Star of the shoji screen
My vision may have been slightly blurry at the end.
Take the A415 train
They used to say of the island of Crete that it produces more history than can be consumed locally.
Non son l’umile ancella
“[W]omen are interesting and important in real life. They are not an afterthought of nature, they are not secondary players in human destiny, and every society has always known that.” — Margaret Atwood, February 2017
It’s going to be a lovely party
Overall, this was a superb achievement and a thrilling season opener for the San Francisco Opera.
Stage animal control
Following Gundula Janowitz and Janet Baker, Chris’s Cache sends birthday greetings to another favorite diva—Karita Matilla—with a quartet of broadcasts.
Down by the bay
Michael Anthonio crunches the numbers on San Francisco Opera’s recent seasons and goes straight to the top to General Director Matthew Shilvock for a look at where SF Opera has been and where it’s headed
What ever happened to her?
When the subject of New York City Opera comes up, you always hear the same query: “What happened to City Opera? Are they even performing these days??”
Sweet dream or a beautiful nightmare
Don’t cry for me, Birgit Nilsson
Purple pros
On Friday, June 21st, Opera Parallèle – the Bay Area nomadic, contemporary opera company – together with the Presidio Theatre unveiled their final production of the season, the West Coast premiere of Gregory Spears and Greg Pierce’s Fellow Travelers, an adaptation of Thomas Mallon’s 2007 novel of the same name.
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).