Well, all La Cieca can think is that the New York City Opera has just plain decided to win your doyenne over, because otherwise how can you explain why the company would present an art installation that combines her two very favorite things in the entire universe, i.e., couture and explosions?
Tell us: What was the best of 2025?
Parterre Box concludes the thrilling first year of Talk of the Town by inviting your lightning rod opinions on several more categories of operatic argumentation.
Hans Lick (not pictured) called it! Yes, that’s right, our previous Regie quiz depicted a production of Wagner’s Siegfried. This Inszenierung (for Theater Lübeck) was by Anthony Pilavachi. Now, who’s inszeniering whom here?
[Karita Mattila] “was also remarkably unsexy, which made one wonder what Scarpia was so excited about.” [Wall Street Journal]
Is it just me, or is Patricia Racette on the cusp of turning into Aprile Millo? (Oh, and while we’re on the subject: it certainly took her long enough, but finally The People’s Diva really looks like a diva! Brava, you go on like this!)
“Tosca is no highbrow psychological study — it’s an operatic slasher movie.” [NYP]
Where else? [NYT]
“Don Giovanni …. Ideal for those still wishing your cheating ex will get screwed in the end.” [NYCO]
“Tosca gashes the portrait of the Magdalene (with a breast bared)…” Also: damn those bloggers! Damn them! [NYT]
“Eroticism! Kinkiness! Sacred-cow-skewering! Groin!” — New York Times
A willfully ignorant old queen turns up his nose at something he hasn’t seen: “idiotic…. third rate.” In other news, dog bites man. [NYT]
This is it, cher public, the big night… and you’ve found the place to be. The traditional (that word again!) yakfest during the Met’s opening night festivities will take place here at parterre.com from 6:00 pm until the curtain falls. Members of the public attending the event proper or the various HD relays are invited…
Danielle de Niese has emailed blog A Liberal’s Libretto insisting that she was misquoted on her now-notorious “elephants” one-liner.
See the new posting that will appear at 5:45 pm entitled “Overture! Light the Lights!” — this will be your official one-stop location for tonight’s chat during the Met’s Tosca.
An old clip, but worth repeating: Gina Lollobrigida plays Lina Cavalieri plays Floria Tosca in La donna più bella del mondo.
A video glimpse of the new Tosca, from the New York Times. The wig needs some major cleaning up.
Ya are 91 years old today!
Two days ago, Thurdsay, September 17, marked a new peak for parterre.com. On that day, you, the cher public, viewed the site a total of a whopping 18,323 times — the highest number of pageviews on a single day ever recorded! La Cieca suggests you all treat yourselves to Champagne, and your doyenne may just…
Following up on her rant in an earlier thread, La Cieca now proposes the debate continue on the perhaps not perfectly defined issue of “composer’s intentions.” After the jump, discussion material.
La Cieca thinks the following is among the most obnoxious puffery things ever written about an opera singer, and it’s surely the worst bit in the tongue bath the New York Times Magazine gives Danielle de Niese:
In response to readers’ requests, here’s the 2009-2010 Met Sirius/XM broadcast schedule, in printable form.
Today La Cieca prepares to usher in the New Year in the way that has been traditional among her people for thousands of years…
Obviously, Danielle de Niese is all about the singing, or, anyway, all about the slamming bod, and then the singing. But she does talk from time to time, and when she talks, she sounds strangely familiar.
[SPOILER ALERT! MAY CONTAIN DETAILS YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE BEFORE YOU ATTEND THE PRODUCTION!]
She’s been dubbed “The Beautiful Voice,” “America’s Soprano,” “Opera MILF,” “Ney-Ney,” and now “The People’s Diva.” If there’s anything Renée Fleming doesn’t need, it’s another, whaddyacallit, another sobriquet. And yet, La Cieca does not consider need when she’s feeling generous, so she has decided that it is time to create yet one more nickname for…
A Baroque Valentine’s with Opera Lafayette | Feb | DC & NYC
Celebrate love in all its guises with tender ballads, amorous duets, cheeky verses, and bawdy drinking songs plus food, cocktails and wine.
