Don’t expect any sweeping statements from Franz Welser-Möst ‘s polished, if dramatically inert, Fidelio.
Madama Butterfly confronts anime, virtual reality, and weeaboos in Matthew Ozawa‘s bold production at the Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Lise Davidsen, Michael Spyres, and Yannick Nézet-Séguin are astonishing in Tristan und Isolde at the Met, while Yuval Sharon‘s new production is anything but.
In his new production that opens at San Francisco Opera this weekend, Matthew Ozawa is creating a Parsifal for the cancel culture age.
This Bard production, led by Leon Botstein, makes the strongest possible case musically, dramatically and visually for Smetana’s opera Dalibor.
Ahead of tomorrow’s Live in HD, Michael Steinberg talks Leonore, Salome, and the “endemic misogyny” of Claus Guth‘s new production
Fidelio, which opened last week at the Metropolitan Opera, will always be relevant, I fear.
Eli Jacobson inaugurates parterre box’s new “Perspectives on the Aria” feature with a deep dive into Leonore’s “Abscheulicher!” from Beethoven’s Fidelio which returns to the Metropolitan Opera tomorrow with the Met’s current dramatic soprano star Lise Davidsen as Leonore.
Not even howling winds and thunderous rain could dampen the excitement of Bay Area audiences to experience Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen for the first time in the Bay Area at Zellerbach Hall Berkeley last Tuesday, 4 February.
Are Beethoven’s symphonies overplayed? Yes, but for a reason. While this justification may sound cliché, Beethoven’s humanist universalism is a sentiment that feels urgent in an era of widespread polarization and pessimism.
Patrick Mack reviews yet another Puccini album from Jonas Kaufmann
Washington National Opera rounded out its season opening weekend with a one-night-only performance entitled “Gods & Mortals: A Celebration of Wagner” the evening after the premiere of its new production of Fidelio.
If Zambello’s season-ending Turandot last year represented some of the best of what WNO can offer in the standard rep, this Fidelio was a regression to the mean.
Judith Malafronte sits down with bass David Leigh who debuts as Rocco in Washington National Opera’s production of Fidelio next week
Following Gundula Janowitz and Janet Baker, Chris’s Cache sends birthday greetings to another favorite diva—Karita Matilla—with a quartet of broadcasts.
Rachel Willis-Sørensen might be the greatest American soprano right now who doesn’t sing much in America.
A revival of Peter Konwitschny’s rightly legendary Don Carlos and Dmitri Tcherniakov’s confounding new Salome: both turned out to be unforgettable!
Chris’s Cache wraps up November with Régine Crespin’s Chicago Leonore; two rare Met Fidelios headed by Christa Ludwig and Hildegard Behrens; and a concert performance with Birgit Nilsson led by Leonard Bernstein, plus a final twist: excerpts of Carol Vaness in Leonore.
Chris’s Cache offers up a quintet of intriguing “forgotten” Leonora-Azucena pairings from the 1970s.
The wicked poisoner showed herself in fine form, full of purple passion and lusty music-making that would gladden the heart of any bel canto enthusiast or opera lover in general.
Diva November meets Wagner December when Chris’s Cache this week offers Régine Crespin as both Elisabeth in Tannhäuser and Senta in Der Fliegende Holländer via a pair of American pirates from the 1960s.
Sondra Radvanovsky has an unconventional voice that is suited to unconventional characters and is best used in rangy, difficult music. The lack of lush beauty was no deficit in depicting Medea’s jealousy and vengeful rage.
These are my findings and opinions (and I welcome rebuttals)!
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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