Breaking: horses not to be frightened Breaking: horses not to be frightened

“Our patrons are also our investors, and because many of our core subscribers are also our most generous philanthropists, we need to make sure that our programming jives with their expectations, what they’d like to see onstage.”

on September 22, 2015 at 2:15 PM
Once upon a Thames Once upon a Thames

“Likewise Susan Bullock and Nicholas Phan—leading exponents of Wagner and Britten respectively…”

on August 22, 2014 at 11:26 AM
Fog lifts over channel Fog lifts over channel

“When you read, and credit, the more feverish musings of the internet chatterati, there is some kind of British invasion storming the bastions of American opera.”

on March 16, 2014 at 2:01 PM
Kate Royal, Toby Spence ink 10-year Met deal Kate Royal, Toby Spence ink 10-year Met deal

Robert Rattray, who has long experience in artist management, has been appointed the Met’s next assistant general manager for artistic affairs, replacing Sarah Billinghurst, who will retire at the end of this season after two decades at the Met, the company announced Tuesday.”

on February 18, 2014 at 2:31 PM
Out of Touch Out of Touch

In a press release that was obviously sent in 1985 and for some bizarre reason only just arrived an hour ago, Lyric Opera of Chicago has announced the production of a new Ring cycle with Sir Andrew Davis conducting and David Pountney directing.

on January 17, 2014 at 1:26 PM
Not canard, more loon Not canard, more loon

“More telephone ring tones come from Bizet’s Carmen that any other opera.”

on January 10, 2014 at 4:12 PM
The Life and Death of Colonel Canard The Life and Death of Colonel Canard

La Cieca can’t even

on January 03, 2014 at 11:47 AM
Why Rupert Christiansen is the wrong commentator about gay rights protesters Why Rupert Christiansen is the wrong commentator about gay rights protesters

The veteran British critic click-whored

on November 08, 2013 at 11:00 AM
Queer canard Queer canard

“That [Tchaikovsky] committed suicide cannot be doubted, but what precipitated this suicide has not been conclusively established…”

on September 20, 2013 at 11:01 AM
Wack on Wacker Wack on Wacker

The announcement of the 2013-2014 season at Lyric Opera of Chicago is not good news at all.

on February 08, 2013 at 2:11 PM
Update on great operatic scandals of the 20th century Update on great operatic scandals of the 20th century

Noted junk sculptor Dr. Jonathan Miller is now the subject of a biography and it appears he’s mellowed in his old age.

on December 01, 2012 at 3:58 PM
Provocative ad provokes, surprisingly Provocative ad provokes, surprisingly

But not everyone is amused.

on October 05, 2012 at 10:27 AM
Decrease your word power Decrease your word power

La Cieca is starting a new series of Words Critics Need to Stop Using.

on February 17, 2012 at 11:19 AM

“Time and tide wait for no one” pontificates Myrtle the barmaid, setting the tone for André Previn’s opera about fleeting romance but enduring love:  Brief Encounter.  Loosely based on the play Still Life by Noël Coward and the screenplay for the film Brief Encounter by Coward and David Lean, this opera (now on CD) tells…

on June 06, 2011 at 10:29 AM

Houston Grand Opera’s Brit-in-Chief Anthony Freud will take an early departure of his post (recently extended to 2015) to move into the power vacuum created by the departure of William Mason from Lyric Opera of Chicago in 2012, says Culturemap Houston.

on April 20, 2011 at 5:29 PM

“A profile of Richard Eyre – ‘All good actors are quick-witted’, 27 November, page 12, Review – mentioned the theatre director’s recollection of having played one of the Three Little Maids in a school production of The Pirates of Penzance. Clarification has since come from the interviewee that in Pirates he played Kate, one of…

on December 06, 2010 at 12:28 PM

Given the choice, I’ll take Hans Neuenfels.

on July 25, 2010 at 9:03 PM

Next time you feel like rolling your eyes at one of La Cieca’s informal for-entertainment-only polls, put then back in your head and gaze on this silliness.

on June 15, 2010 at 5:27 PM

Impresarios from Cornwall to Caithness are delighted to hear today that another traditionally Albion-adminstered opera company has begun the succession process with the search for a new heir-presumptive. Or, in other words, Glimmerglass General and Artistic Director Michael MacLeod is out the door at the end of the 2010 season, and now we just have…

on February 25, 2010 at 12:47 PM

“To Kettles Yard in Cambridge for the premiere of a new song cycle by Richard Baker, performed by baritone Christopher Purves and pianist Andrew West. Having started off in Harvey and the Wallbangers, Purves is now a rising British operatic star: he will sing Beckmesser at Welsh National Opera alongside Bryn Terfel in Die Meistersinger…

on February 10, 2010 at 8:03 AM

A drag queen friend of La Cieca’s — long before she was La Cieca — used to have an expression she to describe the terminally inept. The queen would say, “That guy could screw up a blowjob.” By which she meant, of course, receiving a blowjob, i.e., just sitting there, or standing there or whatever.

on January 24, 2010 at 2:18 PM

“It was… immediately clear that neither Finnish soprano Soile Isokoski nor French mezzo Sophie Koch were going to provide wildly enchanting interpretations of the Marschallin and Octavian…. But the most exciting element of the evening was the Sophie of the young British soprano Lucy Crowe, floating through the ecstasy of the Presentation of the Rose…

on December 08, 2009 at 1:30 PM

Brit crit calls Nico Muhly‘s work “slow, painful death”; Nico calls Brit crit “cunty” and makes fun of the funny way they spell stuff. Which means that the 2011 premiere of Two Boys at ENO should be great fun for all us sport fans. [The Guardian]

on October 20, 2009 at 10:47 PM

La Cieca should know by now that any think piece that kicks off with the locution “I have from time to time wrestled with this conundrum” is just going to piss her off and she should just close the tab. But she didn’t, and this is what she found a little lower down (in more…

on October 03, 2009 at 12:49 PM
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