(Credit: Enrico Nawrath) Controversy was in full force as the second run of performances of the Bayreuth’s “Ring des Nibelungen” kicked off on August 10. Conductor Cornelius Meister had to step in on very short notice to replace a sick colleague. Tomas Konieczny, who sang Wotan, fell on the set in the second act of “Die Walküre” and had to {…}
(Photo: Opera Holland Park 2022 © Ali Wright) Following on from last season’s imaginative realization of “The Pirates of Penzance,” Charles Court Opera returned to the Holland Park stage in a co-production of “HMS Pinafore”. W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan’s satire on class, manners, and buffoonery as directed by John Savournin. Savournin has built quite the reputation in G&S as {…}
(Photo: ROF/Amati Bacciardi) Pesaro’s Rossini Opera Festival kicked off its 43rd season in splendid style with a presentation of the composer’s “Le Comte Ory” conducted by Diego Matheuz and directed by Hugo De Ana, with a stellar cast which included Juan Diego Flórez, Julie Fuchs and Maria Kataeva. Not only did it prove to be a magical musical experience, but {…}
Photos by: Sachyn Mital, © Lincoln Center Jeanine De Bique is one of the most exciting sopranos to catch onstage these days. Animated, joyful, and technically flawless, the Trinidadian vocalist with the light, starry voice that soars before landing on audiences’ ears like a musical meteor shower. While De Bique does staged productions, she throughly enjoys singing in concert format. {…}
Pianist/composer Felix Jarrar and soprano Michelle Trovato partnered to stage a themed recital centered on Mary Queen of Scots, titled “We’ve Come to Claim the Throne,” on July 29, 2022, at St. John’s in the Village, New York City. The theme came to Jarrar via soprano Michelle Trovato, who had been thinking for some time about a program focusing on {…}
(Photo: Ruth Walz) It never ceases to surprise how Monteverdi’s operas prove themselves time and again to be not just supreme examples of how the art form succeeds as a dramatic medium, able to communicate directly with present day audiences, with characters who resonate so clearly with the modern mind, even over a distance of 400 years, but also the {…}
(Photo: Monika Ritttershaus) The initial impressions of the Aix-en-Provence festival’s production of Rossini’s “Moïse et Pharaon” did not bode well. Hearsay reports spoke of a modern day reinterpretation in which the focus was on refugees, and their life in the camps and the perils they face when crossing the Mediterranean. Productions which seek to politicize an opera, beyond that which {…}
(Photo: Monika Rittershaus) To mark the 700th anniversary of Dante Aligheri’s death in September 1321, the Aix-en-Provence festival staged the world premier of French composer Pascal Dusapin’s opera “Il Viaggio, Dante,” based upon the poet’s iconic narrative poem “The Divine Comedy.” To say that this is an ambitious undertaking is an understatement, especially as the work has been compressed into {…}
Raven Chacon, a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, performer, and installation artist from Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation, composed a series of 13 scores as portraits dedicated to different contemporary American Indian, First Nations, or Mestiza women working in music performance, composition, or sound art. Currently on view in the 2022 Whitney Biennial, this work creates space for better understanding the Yankton Dakota {…}