For the birds
A “lone voice in the wilderness” booed Barbara Frittoli’s calamitous Nedda.
Review
“Tosca” at the Séance
New York City Opera has officially launched its “renaissance” at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater last night with a production of Puccini’s Tosca that should please a lot of older, conservative audiences, if not the adventurous operagoers that City Opera courted in the past.
After dark
The Canadian Robert Carsen would appear to love the theater to the point of fixation.
The rules of attraction
Is Manon Lescaut a cold, clinical tale of the splendors and pitfalls of transactional sex, or is it a romantic Italian opera at its most lush and melodic?
Embroidered silk
Maria Agresta‘s delicately-acted, sumptuously-sung seamstress transformed what might have been just an average Wednesday night revival into something finer.
A fire upon the deep
Returning after 99 years for the Met’s annual New Year’s Eve gala, Bizet’s youthful exercise in Orientalia Les Pêcheurs de Perles proved a real crowd-pleaser.
And never brought to mind
It would be generous to say that history comes alive on the operatic stage.
Significant mother
Fans of divas who sing 19th and 20th century opera may find themselves searching in vain for CDs to buy with this season’s gift cards, since their idols so rarely put out solo recitals these days.
A Pole in the head
Enthusiasm is contagious–you have to cover up carefully lest it make you sick.
Gold diggers
Das Rheingold is the outlier among the Ring operas, an ensemble work with a fast-shifting plot, animated dialogue, fewer set pieces and less character development.
By Adriel
7 comments
Ardori inospiti
The most recent Egyptian voluptuary of 2006 by our friend Franco has now been replaced by the most singularly spartan production of Verdi’s masterpiece I think I’ve ever seen.
Wan lake
The sound of Joyce DiDonato, Lawrence Brownlee and John Osborn nailing La Donna del Lago’s thrilling second-act trio alone made worthwhile enduring one of the ugliest, most bone-headed productions seen at the Metropolitan Opera in many a year.
Gold school
The name Joseph Rumshinsky might ring a bell (or a shofar).
Gli enigmi sono due
Giacomo Puccini’s final opus interruptus is and shall always remain my favorite opera. The reasons for this preference are so varied and numerous that if they were printed and bound the volume would most assuredly require its own stand.
Out of hell
One can only pray that “three strikes, you’re out” applies at the Met. If so, we can rest easy that Jeremy Sams won’t be getting any new assignments.
Busyness as usual
Emilio Sagi’s production of The Barber of Seville is ungepotchket in the flesh.
La farsa del destino
There might be nothing in the world as joyous as a Rossini overture.
Where have all the bubbles gone?
As a whole, the evening seemed forced and a bit dispiriting.
Tell me about the rabbits
Our Own JJ confesses he just doted on Heartbreak Express, but “You Us We All was not my cup of twee.”
Humans of old Madrid
Bare Opera, the feisty little company that gave Debussy’s exquisite L’Enfant Prodigue in Chelsea last spring, is now operating in chic, rundown Bushwick where so many original enterprises sprout.
Consider the subtleness of the sea
Hopefully the assignment of Herman Melville’s endless whaling opus Moby-Dick as compulsory reading for High School students is a thing of the past.
La figlia dell’aria
For her third solo recording, Olga Peretyatko summons the two men who launched her career less than a decade ago
Enigma variation
On Thursday evening Jennifer Wilson “finally” made a belated, disappointing Met debut as Turandot.
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).