Ensemble Modern has been named the recipient of the “Silver Lion” at the 2024 Biennale Musica di Venezia. In addition to the ensemble’s award, composer Rebecca Saunders receives the “Golden Lion” for Lifetime Achievement. Starting off the celebrations, on Sept. 26, Ensemble Modern opens the festival at the Teatro la Fenice with the Orchestra del Teatro under the baton of {…}
The Curtis Institute will host a workshop of “Daughter of God” on May 10, 2024. The opera for chamber ensemble and mezzo-soprano explores the story of Leah, a Christian influencer, who after a battle with cancer reveals that her illness is terminal. However, new technology allows her to transcend her physical form by having her consciousness uploaded to an AI {…}
Brooklyn-based Roulette is set to present Robert Ashley’s “Foreign Experiences” starting on May 9. The three-performance run, which comes to a close on May 11, will be the first full performance of the opera since 1995. The work is part of Ashley’s operatic tetralogy “Now Eleanor,” which dates from the early 1990s. The work follows Don who leaves the Midwest {…}
(Photo credit: Mark Allan) The Philharmonia Orchestra in the U.K. has unveiled the first half of its 2024-25 season. Here is a rundown of the vocal performances on offer. First up is a program featuring works by Grieg and Sibelius as well as the U.K. premiere of María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir’s “Oceans.” Soprano Johanna Rusanen and baritone Tommi Hakala are {…}
The Curtis Institute of Music has announced the expansion of its conducting program, while also making Yannick Nézet-Séguin the school’s Head of Conducting In his new role, the Met Opera’s Music Director will oversee the newly expanded program and work individually with conducting fellows on operatic and symphonic repertoire. The fellows will also work with the school’s voice and opera {…}
Albert Edward Sutherland’s film “Champagne Waltz” (1937) is many things. A film where jazz coolness and Viennese waltz culture combine in a forceful yet graceful dance of push and pull, punctuated by a story about a romance born from rivalry as two cultures butt heads before ultimately capitulating to the other. Starring soprano Gladys Swarthout, whose singing in the film was {…}
Photo credit: Marco Caselli Nirmal Vivaldi’s “Orlando Furioso” is a work that represents baroque opera at its most exciting. Set on Alcina’s magical island, where the weird and wonderful are commonplace, it opens up the possibility for colorful and spectacular stagings with shipwrecks, fantastical beasts, monsters and statues that come to life. There are high mountains, wooded groves, steep cliffs {…}
After leaving the premiere of La Fenice’s production of “Mefistofele,” I dried two little tears from my eyes and, in a burst of emotion, was possessed by one thought: how underrated Boito is. Usually relegated merely to the place of the fanciest of Verdi’s librettists, Boito was much more. His works extend from a few musical pieces to many (untranslated {…}
The Opera Cowgirls return to New York City on May 8. The all-woman, alt-country opera fusion band ensemble will give a review of their most popular songs, including folk arrangements of the famous arias “Mon Coeur” and “O Mio Babbino Caro,” the Bizet and Parton mashup “Country Carmen” and their original song “Pearlsnaps and Pearls.” Mezzo-soprano and founder Caitlin McKechney {…}
(Photo credit: Victoria Cadisch) The Ryedale Festival has announced its programming for the 2024 season. This article features classical vocal works only. Mezzo-soprano Victoria Simmonds, the RSMF Ryedale Primary Choir, Ryedale Voices, Harmonia, The RyeLarks, and the Kirkbymoorside Town Junior Brass Band present the first “Community Song Cycle” by John Barber and Hazel Gould. The concert also features storyteller Rosie {…}
The Teatro dell’Opera di Roma has announced a cast change for its final performance of “La Sonnambula” on April 17. The company announced that Ruth Iniesta would sing the title role replacing Lisette Oropesa. Iniesta sang the opera on April 16 as part of the second cast and also filled in for Oropesa during the second act of the April {…}