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Reviews, Stage Reviews

Bayreuth Festival 2022 Review: Tristan und Isolde

https://operawire.com/bayreuth-festival-2022-review-tristan-und-isolde/

While taking in a divisive production of “Der Ring des Nibelungen,” it was quite refreshing to take in the August 12 performance of “Tristan und Isolde” and come away hearing deserved bravos and cheers. While most productions are usually planned years in advance, director Roland Schwab was only commissioned to take on this a new production of Wagner’s masterpiece in {…}

Reviews, Stage Reviews

The Whitney Biennial 2022 Review: Raven Chacon’s ‘For Zitkála-Šá’

https://operawire.com/the-whitney-biennial-2022-review-raven-chacons-for-zitkala-sa/

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 {…}

News

Opera Philadelphia Announces First Annual Opera on Film Series

https://operawire.com/opera-philadelphia-announces-first-annual-opera-on-film-series/

Opera Philadelphia has announced its first annual opera on film series. The event will be part of the O 2022 Festival and will show 30 cinematic operas over 12 screenings at the Philadelphia Film Center. Opera on Film will be presented from Tuesday, Sept. 27 through Sunday, Oct. 2 and will feature a big-screen binge of the operatic art form’s {…}

Special Features

Page to Opera Stage: Destruction of Self in Thomas Mann’s & Benjamin Britten’s ‘Death in Venice’

https://operawire.com/page-to-opera-stage-destruction-of-self-in-thomas-manns-benjamin-brittens-death-in-venice/

“Page to Opera Stage” looks at stories – real-life or fiction, old and new – that have inspired operas, and the ways these narratives have been edited and dramatized to fit a new medium. In this instalment, Thomas Mann’s “Death in Venice” proved the inspiration for a very different opera  It is often said all writers draw from their own {…}

Reviews, Stage Reviews

Bayreuth Baroque Festival 2021 Review: Carlo il Calvo

https://operawire.com/bayreuth-baroque-festival-2021-review-carlo-il-calvo/

(Photo: Falk von Traubenberg) Very occasionally we are fortunate enough to experience an opera production that leaves an indelible imprint on our memories; a never-forgotten experience in which adjectives such as ‘brilliant,’ ‘breath-taking’ or ‘stunning’ come to mind and can be used without any sense of exaggeration. Such was the case with Bayreuth Baroque Festival’s performance of Nicolà Porpora’s opera {…}

Behind the Scenes, Interviews

Q & A: Barbara Hendricks on the UNHCR, Compassion & Refugees

https://operawire.com/q-a-barbara-hendricks-on-the-unhcr-compassion-refugees/

(Credit: © UNHCR/Markel Redondo) Opera audiences may know Barabra Hendricks for her historical operatic performances and her forays into jazz. But for the past 35 years, Hendricks has dedicated her work to the UNHCR as the longest-serving Goodwill Ambassador. She has traveled to Mozambique, Zambia, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Ethiopia, Burkina Faso, and Cote D’Ivoire as an ambassador and visited refugee {…}

IndieOpera

Hartford Opera Theater to Present ‘Fortune’s Children’

https://operawire.com/hartford-opera-theater-to-present-fortunes-children/

Hartford Opera Theater is set to present the world premiere of “Fortune’s Children: A Zoom Opera” on Oct. 16 and 17, 2020. The new work, composed and written by David Wolfson, will be performed live with three singers from different states including Darius A. Gillard, Markel Reed, and Thao Nguyen. The opera takes place at the beginning of the next {…}

Special Features

‘Death in Venice’ (in San Francisco) – One of OperaWire’s Writers Remembers Britten Opera Production From a Unique Perspective

https://operawire.com/death-in-venice-in-san-francisco-one-of-operawires-writers-remembers-britten-opera-production-from-a-unique-perspective/

San Francisco’s spring opera production of “Death in Venice” in 1975 was the real deal—the ingenious novella of German writer, Thomas Mann, turned into a haunting and exquisite opera by the English composer Benjamin Britten, libretto by Mfanwy Piper. The production was created by the remarkable Gerald Freedman, a well-known  American theater and opera director, assistant not only to New {…}

News

Berlin’s Leading Epidemiologists Claim that Attending Opera Performances With Full Audiences is Safe

https://operawire.com/berlins-leading-epidemiologists-claim-that-attending-opera-performances-with-full-audiences-is-safe/

(Credit: Deutsche Oper Berlin / Leo Seidel) UPDATE: Since the publication of this article, the Charité’s leadership has distanced itself from the statements made in this article. Here is the full update.  Leading German epidemiologists from Berlin’s Clinic Charité have published a revised study suggesting that opera houses and concert halls should allow every seat in the audiences to be {…}