(Photo credit: Suzanne Vinnik) Palm Beach Opera has announced its 2025 season. The season opens with Gounod’s “Roméo et Juliette,” under the baton of Palm Beach Opera’s Ari Rifkin Music Director, David Stern. The title roles will be shared across performances. Friday/Sunday Long Long performs Romé alongside Amina Edris as Juliette. Eric Taylor and Lydia Grindatto will each make their {…}
The Samoan Pene Pati is a sumptuously voiced tenor. He boasts a quintessentially lyrical sound, timbered as if made for virtually anything out of the great Romantics’ operatic pen. In “Nessun Dorma,” he once again proves his qualities: After his 2022 debut on Warner Classics, he takes on a heavily eclectic repertory which he navigates with remarkably executed showpiece notes, {…}
Photo: Andy Henderson This review is of the premiere on Friday, July 26, 2024. Bard SummerScape Festival 2024 took a daring leap, presenting Giacomo Meyerbeer’s “Le Prophète” in a fully staged production. This opera is a rarity, and after sitting through it, I can see why. It’s probably best left on the fringes of the repertoire but shouldn’t be missed {…}
Iago Campello is set to join Intermusica as the Associate Artist Manager of Vocal and Opera. Campello’s role begins on Sept. 2. He will work alongside the new Head of Vocal and Opera Nathan Morrison on a list of singers to be announced over the next few months. Iago Campello Álvarez is a pianist and artist administrator. At age 12, he {…}
Photo credit: Agathe Poupeney-OnP Thomas Adès’s “The Exterminating Angel” is one of the most successful contemporary operas of the century. Beyond its many productions—the Parisian one being the best of them all—, the opera quickly entered the symphonic repertoire with a very well-crafted symphonic suite. The opera, based on Luís Buñuel’s homonymous film, follows its source material: more than a {…}
The Opéra de Paris has announced its 2024-25 season. Opera Verdi’s “Falstaff” opens the season with a cast that includes Ambrogio Maestri, Olivia Boen, Marie-Andrée Bouchard-Lesieur, Andrei Kymach, Gregory Bonfatti, Marie-Nicole Lemieux, Iván Ayón-Rivas, and Federica Guida. Michael Schønwandt conducts the production by Dominique Pitoiset. Performance Dates: Sept. 10-30, 2024 Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly” will star Eleonora Buratto, Elena Stikhina, Aude {…}
Detroit Opera has announced its 2024-25 season. First up is “La Traviata” in a new production by Francesca Zambello, conducted by Roberto Kalb. The work stars Emily Pogorelc, Galeano Salas, and Rod Gilfry. The new production moves the action to the 1920s. Performance Dates: Oct. 19 – 27, 2024 Next up is Louisa Proske’s production of “Rinaldo” starring Anthony Roth Costanzo, {…}
Opéra de Paris has announced a cast change for its production of “Romeo et Juliette.” The company has stated that Pretty Yende has canceled the performance on June 30, 2023. As a result, the role of Juliette will be performed by Amina Edris. The news comes after Yende took to Instagram following a June 27 performance in which she said {…}
(Credit: Vincent Pontet) Making “La Bohème” in Paris is a strenuous task. After Claus Guth’s unpopular sideral production, it became evident that the City of Light’s operagoers are not eager to see overly conceptual approaches to Puccini’s opera. However, no ambitious stage director will merely imitate one of the many Zeffirelli productions. This is why Theatre des Champs-Elysées brought out {…}
The Opéra de Lille has announced its 2023-24 season celebrating its 100th anniversary. Opera Jarrett Ott sings the title role of Mozart’s “Don Giovanni“ alongside James Platt, Emőke Baráth, Eric Ferring, Chiara Skerath, Vladyslav Buialskyi, Sergio Villegas, and Marie Lys. Emmanuelle Haïm conducts the production by Guy Cassiers. Performance Dates: Oct. 5-15, 2023 Daniel Brenna and Annemarie Kremer star in {…}
Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu has announced a cast change for its April 24 performance of Massenet’s “Manon.” The company said that Amina Edris will sing the title role replacing Nadine Sierra, who performed two nights in a row on April 22 and 23, 2023. Edris has been performing the title role in the second cast of the production and {…}