Photo Credit: Ken Howard The Met Opera presented Wagner’s “Lohengrin” with tenor Piotr Beczała, Wagnerian sopranos Tamara Wilson and Christine Goerke, under the direction of François Girard, and Maestro Yannick Nézet-Séguin, for the 2023 season opening on February 26th. “Lohengrin” was first performed in Weimar, Germany, in 1850 at the Staatskapelle Weimar, under the direction of Franz Liszt. However, the {…}
Photo: Jaclyn Simpson Grammy award-winning baritone Will Liverman performed a comprehensive collection of works by Black composers at Alice Tully Hall on February 15, 2023, alongside pianist Paul Sánchez, in an astounding breadth of numerous complexities. The selected songs were from his Grammy-nominated album “Dreams of a New Day: Songs by Black Composers” and presented in collaboration with The Metropolitan {…}
Photo: William Beaucardet It was the third production of Gluck’s “Orphée et Eurydice” in Paris this season; still, it sounds like a completely different opera each time. Les Arts Florissants is arguably the most well-regarded historically informed group in France, so it was with not a little anticipation that I entered the Philharmonie de Paris building for this “Orphée.” First, {…}
Photo: Tristan Cook On Feb. 10, 2023, Chamber Music Society (CMS) of Lincoln Center presented the final program in this year’s WinterFest. Titled “The Magic of Schubert,” the festival celebrates the composer’s famous and lesser-known works, which opened on Jan. 22 with their “Into Eternity” program. This latest program, “From Song,” {…}
Credit: Priamo Tolu The Sardinian landscape is dotted with archeological monuments, burial sites, towers, and dwellings built by the various peoples that long ago settled the island. The Beakers, Nuraghe, Phoenicians, and Romans, to name but a few, have all left their mark. The island’s museums boast impressive collections of artifacts fashioned in metal, glass, stone, and clay that reflect {…}
This is for the performance on Feb. 11, 2023. The posters are all over Paris: Gluck’s “Orphée et Eurydice” is premiering at Thêatre l’Athénée. The announcement is somewhat tempered, however, by the ominous qualifier: ‘freely adapted by Othman Louati.’ Even the most enthusiastic contemporary operagoer must raise their eyebrows when the words ‘freely adapted’ appear after Gluck’s name. The ‘freely’ {…}
Photo : Jennifer Taylor Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall was filled with the wondrous sounds of a talented group of young artists in recital, each of whom had taken part in the 2023 SongStudio. The concert was the culmination of a weeklong series of workshops and masterclasses taught by renowned vocalists Golda Schultz, Hartmut Höll (pianist), and Jamie Barton. Under the {…}
(Photo: Michele Crosera) Premiered in Vienna in 1792, Domenico Cimarosa’s “Il Matrimonio Segreto” proved to be one of the century’s most successful operas, quickly establishing itself across Europe with performances in Milan, London, Barcelona, and Lisbon. In fact, such was its initial success, that not even Mozart, with whom Cimarosa is often compared, was able to create an opera that {…}
Photo credit: Michele Monasta There was a lovely old lady, clearly a regular at Maggio, sitting next to me, who, during the change of the scene, quietly asked, “is it an interval already?” “No, another half of an hour,” I replied. She only sighed in response. There was also a stylish man in his 40s, who stood up twice during {…}