Review
The red attachment of women
Washington National Opera’s final production of the season, seen May 22, is also its high point: a new Turandot directed by Francesca Zambello, updated to the 20th century and featuring the world premiere of a completion of Puccini’s score by composer Christopher Tin and playwright and screenwriter Susan Soon He Stanton.
Monuments man
It has been a great season for prolific Bay Area composer Jake Heggie.
Everything the light touches
Like Emily discovering her gift in The Weight of Light, Vanguard fellows (ideally) come through a process of intense multivocality with a stronger sense of their own individual voice.
Dagonistic pluralism
To bring a well-known story to the stage, many methods are available.
Carmen, domesticated
On May 2, Rebecca Herman‘s conceptualizing of Carmen was a significant departure from the traditional depiction of a marginalized “other,” maintaining a traditional staging in Seville.
With a sound but half its own
Swiss soprano Regula Mühlemann made her New York recital debut at Weill Hall on May 8.
Fox on fox
The Cunning Little Vixen, Leos Janacek’s late-career opera—a wonderous work with an almost miraculous sense of charm and poignance—has found significant success in conservatories.
Come to the record store in old Peking
In the lead up to LA Opera’s mounting of Turandot on May 18th (hooray!) I thought I’d touch on some of my favorite recordings and new re-masters I’ve discovered. I have them all.
Raunchy, wild, and winsome
There was much to love in Andrew Ousley’s Tiergarten: a three-night cabaret revue from Death of Classical and part of Carnegie Hall’s Weimar Festival, performed in the vaulted gothic hall of the Church of St. Mary.
Women of the Hours
In its first go-around in November 2022, Kevin Puts’s The Hours (libretto by Greg Pierce based on the novel by Michael Cunningham and the screenplay for the Stephen Daldry’s 2002 film was a box office bullseye for the Metropolitan Opera.
Voce di donna o D’Angelo
Her star is indeed on the rise, but squarely on her terms.
No strings attached
Madama Butterfly is the opera of the moment.
Hiding in plain sight
An air of discovery pervaded the first New York presentation of La ville morte much the way that it pervades the opera’s plot itself.
On the road again
When it premiered at the Opéra Comique in 1875, Carmen shocked audiences with its frank depictions of female sexuality, the proletariat, and violence: subjects that have ensured the piece’s continued relevance and that have inspired numerous retellings and revisions.
Tito’s, neat
This Clemenza seemed more or less unconcerned with the opera’s political imagination, content to take Tito at his word that his rule is morally enlightened and the citizens at theirs that a benevolent dictatorship is a wonderful thing indeed.
The voice of spring
“I come, I come! ye have called me long;
I come o’er the mountains, with light and song”
Crying ‘Uncle’
Surely it was lightning in a bottle. The announcement that Steve Carell would appear at Lincoln Center’s Beaumont Theater playing the titular Uncle Vanya in Anton Chekhov’s classic play would, of course, be a box office windfall.
“I just sing whatever I can get my throat around”
Rachel Willis-Sørensen might be the greatest American soprano right now who doesn’t sing much in America.
Miracle on 64th Street
Only connect! So sayeth E.M. Forster (via Margaret Wilcox) in Howard’s End.
Dinosaur surviving the crunch
I have a confession and you may need to sit down for it: Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita was one of the gateway drugs to my eventual opera fandom.
Yo soy Daniela
Mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack appeared at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater this past Thursday with pianist Keun-A Lee in a thoughtful and distinctly personal recital program presented by Vocal Arts DC.
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).