(Photo: Rocco Casaluci) Of all the operas ever written possibly none explores the unconscious drive of love with such a stark and uncompromising vision as Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde.” It is not a love tainted by the individual psychologies of its participants, their behavior is not an outcome of a deeper pathology, or molded by the past events which have {…}
(Credit: Marty Sohl / Metropolitan Opera) The operas of Handel are not necessarily standards at the Metropolitan Opera. And to a certain extent, that is understandable. They are rather expansive in runtime with ample casts and a musical style that doesn’t always suit the cavernous hall. But the reality is that these operas, while dating to the 18th century, are {…}
(Credit: Simon Jay Price) Wagner’s biography and character are all over his operas, often transparently so: the wandering, embittered outcast in “The Flying Dutchman;” the revolutionary artist in “Die Meistersinger;” the sensuous hedonist in “Tristan und Isolde.” This may be one of the reasons that some people find his work overbearing and suffocating. Rarely is he identified with the dwarf {…}
(Photo Credit: Wiener Staatsoper GmbH/Michael Pöhn) Ludwig van Beethoven’s only opera “Fidelio” is usually characterized as an operatic work of extraordinary musical and dramatic values. Well-known for its mammoth Overture to Leonore No. 3, and originally entitled “Leonore, or the Triumph of Marital Love,” it carries a powerful message of a brave woman who risks her own life in order {…}
(Credit: Michele Crosera) The Teatro La Fenice’s pairing of Bartok’s “Bluebeard’s Castle” and Samuel Barber’s “A Hand of Bridge” certainly made for an interesting and unusual double bill, although the relationship between the works was not immediately evident. This was recognized by the director Fabio Ceresa who explored possible connections, but finding none, opted to stage them as two distinct, {…}
The Ópera de Oviedo closed its 2019-20 season with Donizetti’s “Lucia di Lammermoor.” “Lucia di Lammermoor” is one of the most popular in the repertoire but also known for it challenging roles. Thankfully for this new production, Oviedo counted on some of the greatest interpreters of the work. With a surprising production, this was an evening to remember. The Diva {…}
(Credit: Frank Wing) “Aci, Galatea e Polifemo” is probably not one of those Handel works that you remember prominently. But it can definitely be among the most memorable when produced with the passion on display in San Francisco recently. Under Nicholas McGegan’s expert baton, the Philharmonia Baroque Chamber Players’ and producers Anthony Roth Costanzo and Cath Brittan and Brooklyn’s National {…}
[Credit: Martha Benedict] For the first production of their 10th anniversary season, Los Angeles’s Pacific Opera Project chose to pair two one-act operas, Puccini’s late comic opera “Gianni Schicchi” with Ravel’s magical “L’Enfant et les sortilèges.” The performance took place at Thorne Hall at Eagle Rock’s Occidental College. Pacific Opera Project (POP) claims that this is the first time these {…}
On Saturday, January 25, 2020, the Tucson Desert Song Festival presented a concert of American songs by Metropolitan Opera bass Morris Robinson and Tucson choral group True Concord. American Folk Hymns The chorus opened with American Folk Hymns, the first of which was “How Firm a Foundation.” Collected by John Rippon, it is said to date to 1787. True Concord’s {…}