Whenever someone thinks of opera, children and teenagers aren’t usually their first thought. However, Opera Grand Rapids, in collaboration with their Emerging artists, and Ellington Academy, Creative Connections, has put a program together that reaches out to younger students and introduces them to the art form. “Children’s Sketch Days,” incorporates 50 students that are split up into classes that acclimate {…}
Opera Orlando is opening its new 2017-2018 season in the park! The company’s first production will open on August 21, 2017, at 2 P.M., featuring Mezzo-soprano Amanda Crider. The next weekend “The Three Baritones,” Nathan Stark, Brain Myer, and Gabriel Pressier, will perform. Finally, Tenor Marco Panuccio will end the summer series for Opera Orlando. All of the concerts will {…}
The Hartford Opera Theatre presents a new opera “The Faith Operas.” Debuting to the world on April 8, 2017, at the Charter Oak Cultural Center, the work is split into four performances, revolving around four central issues: faith, religion, love, and family. The composer, David Wolfson, developed the idea about four short operas revolving around faith and ran with the {…}
This year marks the 50th year in business for Opera Grand Rapids. They just released their 2017-18 schedule and it’s packed with such a variety of opera events! “Balance is our programming mantra for the season,” Maestro James Meena, Opera Grand Rapids artistic director said. “We strive to create season schedules that include the familiar as well as the new.” {…}
With much anticipation, the New Amsterdam Opera is bringing “La Forza del Destino” back to the stage in New York City after a long absence. “We believe that this work has not been performed in New York City in at least ten years,” said Keith Chambers, artistic director. This rare concert performance will happen on Friday, March 24th in Manhattan {…}
This Post is for the performance on March 18, 2017. For audiences expecting a normal night out to see cabaret sung by the usual voice types, this was no such night. The SubCulture, an underground performance venue near the East Village, was presenting an evening of musical theater composer, Jason Robert Brown (Tony-award winning composer of Parade and Bridges of Madison {…}
The Olivier Award nominations have been announced with numerous operas earning recognition. In the Best New Opera category, Jan Philipp Gloger’s production of Mozart’s “Così fan Tutte” for the Covent Garden has been nominated alongside Philip Venables’ “4.48 Psychosis,” which was staged at the Lyric Hammersmith and won a UK Theatre Award in October 2016. English National Opera’s “Lulu” and “Akhnaten” round out the nominees in {…}
It’s Oscar Sunday this weekend and while it may seem irrelevant to the world of opera, the art form has been present numerous times at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In celebration of the Academy Awards, OperaWire takes a look at times when opera stars or films were nominated at the Academy Awards. 2016 Last awards season {…}
Opera has been used in the mainstream throughout history with many film directors like Martin Scorsese, Tom Ford, Francis Ford Coppola and Joe Wright inserting the art form into their films for crucial scenes. Some, like James Gray, have even been influenced by the art form and have made films that evoke opera. Gray’s “The Immigrant,” was made after he saw {…}
The Teatro alla Scala has announced that Georges Prêtre has died at the age of 92. The company released a statement that said, “Georges Prêtre, one of the greatest conductors of our time, had a fifty-year relationship with La Scala. He made his debut in 1966 conducting a legendary production of Gounod’s ‘Faust’ with Mirella Freni, Nicolai Gedda and Nicolai {…}
Mozart was a huge hit throughout his short career and his great success has continued in 2016 in the form of 1.25 million international CD sales of Deutsche Grammophon’s “Mozart 225: The Complete Edition” in a whopping five weeks since its release. The boxset, made up of 200-CD’s and encompassing every single work ever created by the composer, was released {…}