In news that La Cieca is pretty sure has fallen far below Jeffrey Vanderveen‘s radar screen, a further casting rumor for next season’s Rienzi at Opera Orchestra of New York has emerged. As if Lauren Flanigan (Irene) were not superstar enough to supply name recognition for the company’s 47th production of the Wagner opus, the…
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.
Legendary, lovely Evelyn Lear is a lady who knows what she wants. La Cieca hears that for a recent master class engagement, the veteran diva had only a few simple requirements: “Cups and water, and the water should not be iced; a mirror; and a box of Kleenex for when I make the students cry.”…
As La Cieca first reported back in March, Jeffrey Vanderveen, recently split from IMG, will now head up Universal Music Classical Artists Management and Productions, a division “meant to provide management services for and produce live events for prominent classical musicians.” IMG has responded by filing filed suit against Vanderveen and other Universal honchos, claiming…
La Cieca has to say that the funniest health code violation story she’s read in, well, days and days is the AP item entitled “NYC Health Department: Mice at Met Opera.” The hilarity begins in the very lede of the piece, which reads On-stage villains aren’t the only vermin at the Metropolitan Opera. Just as…
No video for this event (yet) but here are the ladies of The View — Sherri Shepherd, Joy Behar, Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Whoopi Goldberg — in competition to decide which of them has the greatest ignorance of opera. (Today was one of Barbara Walters‘ frequent days off, which is a pity because she is at…
[kml_flashembed movie=”http://youtube.com/v/mq0mrk9c15w” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /] [From the YouTube page of Regi184.]
Here’s another (and very different) crop of that production photo of Cecilia Bartoli. You provide the caption. La Cieca will get you started: “L’amore di Fay Wray.”
La Cieca has just heard the fascinating report that Cecilia Bartoli is to star in the musical biopic The Maria Guleghina Story, playing “Young Maria.” In related news, Maria Guleghina has accepted a featured role in The Cecilia Bartoli Story as “Herself” in a sequence based on the making of the musical biopic The Maria…
Not a single comment about this week’s podcast? Was La Cieca’s little attempt at humor really so feeble as all that? Or has the cher public tired of Montserrat Caballé‘s Donizetti?
Soprano Elizabeth Futral and tenor Stephen Costello bring a cougarific vibe to Fort Worth Opera Festival‘s Lucia di Lammermoor May 25 through June 7. The Donizetti work is in repertory with Turandot and Angels in America, so it sounds like Memorial Day Weekend in Fort Worth is about the gayest time to be had in…
Yes, you’re all right. The opera in the last quiz was in fact Roméo et Juliette, featuring hunkentenor Leonardo Capalbo in the tighty whities. Speaking of which, whatever might this opera be?
… a dream that is not about a cow, or even about you, baby. But that’s about all it doesn’t involve. Eventually La Cieca gets around to introducing the final act of Lucrezia Borgia and some other stuff. Lucrezia Borgia, Act 2
La Cieca would not venture to say which of the many selections on the Jessye Norman – A Portrait DVD is the funniest. But this one is certainly right up there. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://youtube.com/v/8noeFpdfWcQ” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /] Also, though it’s been said before, it bears repeating:
“Sony Pictures studio unveiled plans Wednesday for a new digital cinema unit to bring filmed presentations of Broadway shows, rock concerts and sports events to specially equipped movie theaters nationwide.” [USA Today] “The Met’s transmissions of eight live performances to movie theaters reached 908,000 people, more than the total number who attended performances at the…
La Cieca is being hassled mightily at her day job at Widdecomb, Gutterman, Applewhite, Bibberman and Black today, so she’s not able to post her review of Nicholas Limansky‘s lovely new biography of a certain stratospheric singer. The review should appear in the next day or so, but, in the meantime, cher public, please entertain…
La Cieca is thrilled to note that VAI have continued their series of releases from the NHK Lirica Italiana telecasts of the 1960s and 1970s. These DVDs, remastered from original broadcasts on Japanese television, preserve performances by some of the greatest Italian artists of the mid-20th century. The most recent treasure to be unearthed is…
Readers of this morning’s New York Times were privileged to be present at what might be called “the birth an an idée fixe” — that is, Tony Tommasini‘s new obsession. Oddly enough, this new object of TT’s unremitting fascination isn’t something in pants, or, for that matter, something that just wriggled out of its pants. Let’s…
Congratulations to Vanderdecken, was first to identify all eight singers correctly in Sanford‘s quiz. Our wandering Dutchman will have an amazon.com gift card to help him pass his next seven years at sea. So who, you ask, were our eight lovelies? Watch and learn! [kml_flashembed movie=”http://www.youtube.com/v/9yOB_kFHJQ0″ width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /]
La Cieca has just noticed that Decca is about to release a 33-disc collection comprising all the standard Wagner works. (You’ll have to look elsewhere for Das Liebesverbot.) The amazing news here is that this complete traversal of the standard Wagnerian canon is on sale for only $66.99 — yes, that’s right, barely two dollars…
La Cieca’s old, old, old friend Sanford writes:Â
Fiorenza Cossotto. Tichina Vaughn. Irina Arkhipova. Viorica Cortez. Elena Cernei. Big voices. Bigger hair.
As several of you informed La Cieca (some in no uncertain terms) our most recent Regiequiz was a bit dodgy — the opera represented was hardly a standard repertory work, and the stage direction was fairly straightforward. Richard “Wallpaper” Jones directed this production of Gerald Barry’s The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant, a Bremen…
Well, in fact your doyenne just warbles a few bars of a dear old Jerry Herman tune, but the real news is the second part of Montserrat Caballé‘s legendary New York debut as Lucrezia Borgia. Lucrezia Borgia Act 1
Interview with Leyla Gencer in 2007. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://youtube.com/v/5q4je2G7YpE” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /]
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.
STEMdiva status
Ahead of a special boozy, bawdy Valentine’s Day concert, artistic director of Opera Lafayette Patrick Quigley speaks with soprano Maya Kherani about her journey from MIT to rising American Baroque star.