A Pasolini-inspired Tosca at La Monnaie does not quite find the pleasure in the pain.
Das Wunder der Heliane fuses sex with the sacred at a simmering performance at the Opéra National du Rhin.
I saw this production in HD, and it really shocked me because I was used to the cackling mezzo witch, guardian angels, and gingerbread figures.
I was first exposed to Hänsel und Gretel as a child, likely via The Metropolitan Opera’s 1982 PBS telecast.
The Richard Tucker Foundation Gala has always been a big annual celebration of the voice with an emphasis on big-voiced singers in big repertoire (not much Wagner usually, though…). Like so many reliable operatic institutions it has struggled for survival after the pandemic.
Edita Gruberová was one of the most fascinating individuals I have ever known.
A Trove Thursday Mega-Post © featuring the wonderful American soprano Erin Morley in Orff’s Carmina Burana and Richard Strauss’s Brentano Lieder, plus extended live excerpts from Handel’s Orlando, Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, and Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots.
“Once upon a time / Lived a foolish king. / Mocking Death, his crime, / Pure chaos he bring.”
While last year’s finals were dominated by early nineteenth-century bel canto arias, this year’s finalists took on a remarkably broad range of music from a variety of repertoires.
Opera for families may not generally be my thing, but I loved feeling like I was a tiny part of shaping a new opera.
Bring your family: This show is special! Such perfect opera is hard to find!
Brigitte Fassbaender‘s sound is piquant and, I’d hazard to guess, instantly recognizable to anyone familiar with her work.
Once again we got a very frustrating performance of Orlando; this time a beautiful and completely coherent production marred by some sub-optimal singing.
Helga Dernesch is the singer whom I largely credit for rekindling my love for opera.
Academy of Vocal Arts’ Rusalka—surprisingly, only their second venture in many years into the Slavic repertoire—left a divided impression.
Saturday night I navigated the Music Center concourse, or what’s left of it with it’s seemingly eternal construction to the main plaza, wending my way to the Dorothy Chandler for the opening night of LA Opera’s Hansel and Gretel.
“Trove Thursday” gives a preview of Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila with a broadcast featuring an unexpected temptress—Dolora Zajick—who will celebrate the 30th anniversary of her Met debut next month.
The new cast at the Met suggested an alliterative retitling of Lucia di Lammermoor was needed—perhaps Lost Loonies in Love or its Italian equivalent?
Anita Rachvelishvili and Quinn Kelsey towered over an otherwise pedestrian if still exciting Il Trovatore.
I wish to introduce our younger Parterrians to the magical Martha Mödl to commemorate the opening of the Bayreuther Festspiele which opens tomorrow afternoon.
La Campana Sommersa (The Sunken Bell), which is being presented by the New York City Opera at the Rose Theater through April 7, is a true oddball.
With Christmas Eve 2016 falling on a Saturday, the Met offers contrasting orchestral splendors at noon and 6 p.m.
The Hänsel und Gretel discussions over the holidays plunged me down a YouTube rabbit hole.
Enthusiasm is contagious–you have to cover up carefully lest it make you sick.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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