(Photo: Birgit Gufler) Christoph Graupner was a prolific German composer and harpsichordist from the late 17th and 18th centuries. Born near to the German city of Zwickau in 1683, he decided to study law in Leipzig before changing to follow a career in music. By 1705, he found himself working at the Oper am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg as a harpsichordist {…}
With the proposal to reconstruct the world’s first public opera house, Venice’s Teatro San Cassiano, developing apace, OperaWire took the opportunity to meet up with its artistic director, Andrea Marcon, to discuss his aims, justifications, expectations, and hopes for the project. Marcon is one of the world’s leading exponents of baroque repertoire and has conducted performances across the globe, from {…}
Photo: Michele Crosera In 1707, Händel arrived in Rome and soon made the acquaintance of important members of the papacy, including Cardinal Benedetto Pamphilj, from whom he received his first major libretto, “Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno.” Because public performances of operas in Rome had been forbidden by papal ban in 1703, Handel made this an oratorio. Although {…}
(Photo: Brescia & Amisano) One of the more eye-catching works of Teatro La Scala’s current season is Leonardo Vinci’s “Li Zite Ngalera,” which has just finished a run of five performances. Vinci was born between 1690 and 1696 in Italy’s Calabria region but was dead by 1730, possibly poisoned by a jealous husband. Yet during his short life, he was {…}
The 69th Grenada Festival opened its 32-day extravaganza of music with a solemn performance of Mozart’s “Requiem” at the Granada Cathedral. Soloists soprano Katharina Konradi, countertenor Carlos Mena, tenor Xabier Anduaga and bass-baritone Carlos Álvarez joined the Grenada Symphony Orchestra under the baton of conductor Andrea Marcon. The Archbishopric of Granda co-produced the performance with “la Caixa” Foundation. “la Caixa” {…}
(Photo: Monika Rittershaus) Murderous political machinations and pandemic debauchery in the Kingdom of Lombardy in the 7th century were as rampant as any episode of “Game of Thrones” over a millennium later. A neophyte watching the latest series of the Westeros saga without any prior knowledge of its protagonists would find it similarly challenging to work out who is trying {…}