Say this about Oedipus: The character’s got staying power.
La Salustia was Giovanni Batista Pergolesi’s first opera, composed at the tender age of 21. In structure and storyline it’s a conventional baroque opera seria.
That’s what it must have been like in 1726 London when Handel composed Alessandro for perhaps the three most famous (and expensive) singers of the day.
Wagner is becoming an important calling card for Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Theatre.
C-Major continues their full frontal attack on the Verdi catalogue with this release of I Masnadieri which, I’m thrilled to report, does not hail from the Teatro di Regio in Parma like the previous aspirants. We’ve travelled south to Naples and the Teatro di San Carlo and we’re all the better for it as the…
Somewhere around the early 80’s, stage directors realized that the odious theatre practice of “audience involvement” was over.
Giovanni Battista Pergolesi’s best known opera is La Serva Padrona, but the Neapolitan composer also composed several other works, which are now lovingly presented on video by the Fondazione Pergolesi Spontini at Jesi.
A new CD
features the ten most gorgeous minutes recorded by a tenor in Wagner since World War II.
Not only cursed to bear a name nearly identical to that of one of the greatest geniuses who ever lived, Leonardo Vinci also had the misfortune to die just three months after the premiere of his greatest opera, reportedly murdered with a cup of poisoned chocolate at the age of 36.
There’s that old joke; What’s the difference between opera and sex? Punchline; you can have good sex.
Either you adore “The World Is but a Broken Toy” from Act II of Princess Ida and have always wanted to hear it sung by voices of operatic quality… or you don’t… and you haven’t.
If war is hell, then Soldier Songs should rank somewhere around “purgatory.”
I’ve always had a certain affection for Roberto Alagna.
I completely missed The Enchanted Island during the Met’s 2011-12 season, both in the house and in the HD presentation. Even on Sirius, I had only heard snippets of the performance.
It’s easiest to write reviews when there are soaring triumphs and miserable failures.
“So is opera as vibrant as ever, or is it hanging on by a thread? How to write the history of an art form that hovers, Schrödinger’s catlike, simultaneously alive and dead?”
As if last week’s survey wasn’t enough, a few more recent diva-recital disks remain worthy of attention particularly since they arrive from five front-rank singers.
Love grand opera but wary of a six o’clock curtain with five hours of music behind it? (And nothing is grander than Berlioz’s Les Troyens, eh?) Your dilemma has been solved. Show up at the Met at 7:30 or 8:00, whenever they have the first intermission.
You can see the logic of it: The Juilliard School wants to show off its opera program, the Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts, which is (on the evidence) brim-full of talent.
Cecilia Bartoli and Joyce DiDonato are not the only ladies who have recorded recitals this year featuring music from the 17th and 18th centuries.
Natalie Dessay coyly bares a breast on the cover of Virgin Classics’ new Giulio Cesare.
“The courtesan’s entourage included dancing girls in filmy harem pants and bedazzled Afro wigs, and the hunky chorus boys pranced about in velour leggings, codpieces and nipple ornaments.”
Before there was a Stefan Herheim Boheme (which I reviewed a couple of weeks back for this site), there was a Herheim Eugene Onegin, recorded in June 2011 at De Nederlanse Opera.
All of the operas of Giuseppe Verdi contain music that is worth hearing and can be rewarding in good performances.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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