Three years ago when Sonya Yoncheva recorded her first album “Paris Mon Amour,” it was a triumph. It was an album filled with a variety of interesting repertoire and a voice with great color and flexibility. It captured a rising star that was on the path to stardom and gave an incredible vibrancy to each reading on the album. Fast {…}
Many directors who dabble in the lyric theatre seem to think that they know better than the librettist or composer what an opera is about. “Improvements” can range from the introduction of a new character into the drama (eg. Mariusz Treliński’s ubiquitous “Mr. O” in “Yevgeny Onegin” for the Teatr Wielki in Warsaw) to scrawling a specific word onto the {…}
In recent years, Verdi’s “Il Trovatore” has slowly but surely established a potent foothold in the Metropolitan Opera’s standard repertory. The main reason? David McVicar’s striking and still awe-inspiring interpretation of Verdi’s middle-period masterwork. A Master At Work The inspiration of Francisco de Goya and his tableaus is obvious from the opening curtain and onwards. At the core of it {…}
Condensing a full-length novel down to an opera of manageable proportions is a daunting task. Sometimes the challenges seem insurmountable. Take, for example, Ricky Ian Gordon and Michael Korie’s transformation of John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath.” Since its premiere in 2007, it’s gone through several revisions and multiple attempts at downsizing the sprawling story to a find a good, {…}
Back on Jan. 4, I published this piece of criticism on this website. Entitled “Metropolitan Opera 2017-18 Review – Tosca: Yoncheva, Grigolo, Villaume Not Ready for Primetime,” it was clearly no ringing endorsement for the major performers of this hotly anticipated Met Opera production. In fact, it was scathing takedown in some ways of everyone involved, done in the greatest {…}
Bellini’s “La Sonnambula” relies heavily on its star soprano for a satisfactory performance. Written to showcase Giuditta Pasta, one of the greatest divas of the time, the title role of Amina is known for its technical challenges which require the soprano to have complete command of long legato lines with great breath control. It also requires attacking trills and fast {…}
It is always interesting to come across a performance of one of Verdi’s lesser known works, although you cannot always be certain of what you will get. Normally, these works are rarely performed for a reason – namely because they are not particularly strong. “Un Giorno di Regno” immediately springs to mind. But sometimes there seems to be no apparent {…}
Many opera directors today fall onto a particular idée fixe and refuse to let it go, no matter what dramaturgical or textual incongruities ensue. Vera Nemirova’s fazzoletto-laden “Otello” in Bucharest, Hans Neuenfels’ laboratory rats “Lohengrin” in Bayreuth or Krzysztof Warlikowski’s “Brokeback Mountain” “Eugene Onegin” in Munich immediately spring to mind. Joining the ignominious list is Norwegian theatre director, Ole Anders Tandberg’s {…}
In 1802, Gaspare Spontini’s one act farse, “Le Metamorfosi di Pasquale,” was premiered at the Teatro San Moise in Venice to moderate acclaim. It was to be his last work for the Italian stage, as soon after he moved on to Paris and then to Berlin. Unfortunately, along with a number of Spontini’s other works, it was subsequently lost, although {…}