Best of 2024: OperaWire’s Team on the Best Performances of the Year
By OperaWireThere’s been a lot of opera in 2024. And quite frankly, there’s been a lot of good opera.
So as has become our tradition, here is a look at some of OperaWire’s editorial team’s picks for their personal favorite performances of 2024.
Matt Costello: Act three of “Götterdämmerung” – Tanglewood
It’s always a tricky thing to think about one’s “Performance of the Year.” Especially challenging when there were a great number of remarkable performances – for which, at this end of year – I am certainly thankful.
But for this exercise, I used some helpful criteria. First, was it extraordinary? Obvious one that. Then: were all the elements of the performance at the same or similar wonderful level? And finally, is there something perhaps surprising about it….even unexpected? And with that, it was easy to make a choice. This year, during their always fantastic summer season, Tanglewood and the Boston Symphony Orchestra programmed Act three of Wagner’s tetralogy finale, “Götterdämmerung.”
Extraordinary? Well, the BSO, under Andris Nelsons, always hits that mark. And the performers, remarkable as well, led by Christine Goerke’s Brünnhilde and Michael Weinius’s Siegfried. But the entire ensemble was simply wonderful.
And the surprise? That in a summer concert series, people picnicking on the lawn, candles and bubbly often spotted, such a weighty piece was scheduled, and then pulled off. And with such intense drama…despite no sets and mostly minus props, and yet riveting. Totally compelling – and I say this having been to the mecca of Wagner performances, Bayreuth.
Bernardo Gaitan: “Il cappello di paglia di Firenze” – Teatro alla Scala
Mike Hardy: “Andrea Chénier” – Royal Ballet & Opera
2024 was a wonderfully opera-enriched year for me, making it very difficult to pick a single outstanding moment. The amazing Aigul Akhmetshina performed two brilliant stagings of “Carmen,” at the ROH and at Glyndebourne and the incredible Aida Garifulina performed a breathtaking Violetta in the ROH’s “La Traviata.”
Alas, pride of place must fall to the ROH’s production of “Andrea Chenier.” It saw superstar tenor Jonas Kaufmann return to something like his former best after a series of illnesses, not least one which clearly rendered him struggling just two weeks prior to this performance when he took part in the concert celebrating 22 years of Sir Antonio Pappano at the ROH. But this night surely must belong to the wonderful Sondra Radvanovsky who sang the most heart-rending Act three aria, “La mamma morta,” where her character, Maddalena, recounts the death of her mother. Her genuinely tear-inducing rendition was made all the more poignant by virtue of Radvanovsky still mourning the loss of her own Mother in 2022. After the performance, she told me that the last time she had sung it, her mother had been in the audience, and that getting through the aria was a huge, personal struggle.
Alan Neilson: “Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno” – Göttingen International Händel Festival
By chance, all the best performances I attended during 2024 occurred over a couple of months during the summer. All were festival productions. It was a production of
Händel’s oratorio “Il Trionfo del Tempo e Disinganno,” however, that stood out. The work, although being defined as an oratorio, has received many fully staged
performances over the years, albeit with mixed results; the main problem is that its lack of physical action often leads to uninteresting, static productions. Göttingen’s
Händel Festival opted for a concert performance, yet the innovative approach of director Ilka Seifert and Folkert Uhde’s staging managed to create a dramatically
strong reading through the use of live intimate video projections that captured the emotional depths of the characters. There were no costumes or scenery, but it did
not matter; the large screen behind the orchestra focused the audience’s attention on the emotions etched on the singers’ faces in a way that was far more convincing
than one finds in a normal staged performance.
The four soloists, sopranos Anna Dennis and Emöke Baráth, countertenor Xavier Sabata and tenor Emanuel Tomljenovic, produced superb readings that captured the
stunning beauty of Händel’s music while revealing the essence and emotional dimensions of their characters. The Festspielorchester Göttingen, under the masterful direction of George Petrou, produced a sensitive and exquisitely fashioned performance that brought out the work’s elegant beauty along with its full emotional charge.
All the elements came together perfectly to create a truly memorable performance.
Jennifer Pyron: “El Niño” – The Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera debuted John Adams’s “El Niño,” with libretto based on original sources by Peter Sellars and John Adams, to a sold out house of past, present, and future opera goers on Tuesday, April 23rd, 2024. “El Niño” is unlike anything John Adams has done before and the historical timing of this debut is uncanny. This was his fourth work to be performed at Met Opera, including “Doctor Atomic” (2008), “Nixon in China” (2011), and “The Death of Klinghoffer” (2014).
History was made on this night because the majority of the cast made their own debuts, including director Lileana Blain-Cruz, conductor Marin Alsop, soprano Julia Bullock, baritone Davóne Tines, countertenors Key’mon W. Murrah and Siman Chung, set designer Adam Rigg, lighting designer Yi Zhao, projection designer Hannah Wasileski, puppet designer James Ortiz and choreographer Marjani Forté-Saunders.
Director Lileana Blain-Cruz’s dedication to building her own creative team took this production to the new heights that Met Opera dreams about, making this the best performance of 2024. Met Opera will debut John Adams’s newest opera in 2024-25, “Antony and Cleopatra” (2022), which also stars Julia Bullock in the titular role of Cleopatra.
David Salazar: “Ainadamar” – Metropolitan Opera
Some quick shoutouts to Lisette Oropesa in “La Sonnambula” in Rome and Benjamin Bernheim in “Roméo et Juliette” at the Met Opera – two of the most vocally exquisite performances I heard all year. After watching a rather shockingly messy opening performance of “La Gioconda” at Napoli, I was not looking forward to round two. But the team came together and delivered a true knockout, a testament to the beauty of live theater and the second chances it provides. Then there’s the cast of “Die Frau ohne Schatten” at the Met, a true miracle of modern opera. Finally, Teatro Grattacielo’s production of “Beyond the Horizon” was emblematic of how new opera can truly flourish an independent scale.
But as far as THE performance of the year… I saw three of them. And they were all “Ainadamar.” Every single one of these three shows was truly mesmerizing and special. All of them different experiences. All of them revelatory. If you wanted to show people what opera could be and is, this is the perfect piece with which to do it. Because it’s more than opera. It’s a work that pushes the boundaries of what the artform can do. An opera that is truly inclusive not only in its content but in its form – it is opera, theater, flamenco, experimental art, poetry, all wrapped into one. Given the times we live in, we need the Met to champion more works like this.
Francisco Salazar: “La Forza Del Destino” / “Die Frau Ohne Schatten” – Teatro alla Scala / Metropolitan Opera
Picking a best performance is always hard, especially when there are so many memorable performances in a year. How could I forget Lisette Oropesa’s show-stopping “Sonnambula” in Rome and Asmik Grigorian’s heartbreaking “Madama Butterfly” in her Met debut? And what about the amazing production of “La Gioconda” at the Teatro San Carlo directed by Romain Gilbert, who brought opera back to its glory days? And then there was Ailyn Perez and Lucas Meachem giving it their all at the Houston Grand Opera in “Il Trovatore.” And of course, there was Freddie De Tomasso’s Met debut as Cavaradossi. But the best of the year was by far “La Forza del Destino” at the Teatro alla Scala and “Die Frau Ohne Schatten” at the Metropolitan Opera, reminding us that there is still a golden age of singers and opera.
At La Scala, Riccardo Chailly led a skillful and heartfelt performance demonstrating the many colors of Verdi’s music while Leo Muscato gave us a production of Verdi’s work that connected many periods and showed how war is essentially similar no matter the time. Anna Netrebko demonstrated a sincere musicality that was enhanced by her expressiveness, especially in her arias “Son Guinta” and “Pace Pace Mio Dio,” while Ludovic Tezier gave us a Don Carlo that was both virtuosic in its technique but also musical incisive. Brian Jagde demonstrated some gorgeous high notes and true chemistry with his colleagues, while Vasilisa Berzhanskaya, Alexander Vinogradv, and Marco Filippo Romano were exceptional in their supporting roles
At the Met, Lise Lindstrom, Elza Van den Heever, and Nina Stemme were just spectacular as the trio of divas. Nothing could prepare you for the power of these voices and the naturalism they have for this repertoire. By contrast, Micahel Volle gave a subtle and moving performance as Barak, while Russell Thomas showed that he is a tenor to look out for in this repertoire. Ryan Speedo Green was fantastic in his role and Yannick Nezet-Seguin proved to be a worthy conductor of Strauss’ music. Finally, the production by Herbert Wernicke continues to be the masterpiece of the Met and the only production this season that really deserved an HD and sadly is still not recorded for the history books.
Rudolph Tang: “The Savage Land” – China Conservatory of Music
Rudolph submitted a video in which he explains why he loves “The Savage Land.”
John Vandevert: “Khovanshchina” – Berwaldhallen
My favorite performance of 2024 would have to be Berwaldhallen’s “Khovanshchina.” With a highly adept taste for sophistication, each and every one of the soloists performed with exceptional degrees of nuance and tact. However, the star of the night was undoubtedly Nadezhda Karyazina, a brilliant actress and singer who did not express empty gestures for the sake of drama, vocal or otherwise. A stupendous performance and one that was as marvelous as it was inspiring, it was my favorite of the year.
Christina Waters – “Partenope” – San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera’s production of George Frideric Handel’s “Partenope” showcased the electrifying coloratura of French soprano Julie Fuchs. In a season of operatic hits, e.g. SFOpera’s “Carmen,” as well as misses, e.g. the Stefan Herheim “Der Ring des Nibelungen” in Berlin, the Partenope production was almost flawless. In elegant 1920s costuming, in visually playful performative hijinks, and in diamond-edged vocals giving fresh energy to this comedic caper by Handel. The updated Baroque creation, featuring a trio of lovers vying in stealthy fashion for the hand of the Queen of Naples, dprovided virtuosic trills, runs, leaps, and embellishments with apparent and impossible ease.
At the center of the manic stage action was Fuchs, elegant and sexy in the Armani-inspired suits and satins with which she wiped the floor with her many suitors. Fuchs was joined by a brilliant ensemble, notable Alek Shrader as a Man Ray-style photographer, and superb countertenor Italian countertenor Carlo Vistoli, who made his company debut a romantic package of physical drama and liquid velvet timbre. A resounding success in this, and any season.
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