Carnegie Hall has announced its 2020-21 season featuring some of the greatest soloists and conductors in the world. For this article we will highlight the vocal performances of the season. Orchestras The season opens with the LA Philharmonic performing John Adams’ Tromba Lontana and Grieg’s Piano Concerto and Selections from Peer Gynt. Gustavo Dudamel conducts with soloists Liv Redpath and {…}
The Houston Grand Opera has announced its 2020-21 season featuring a number of established as well as rising stars. Here is a detailed look at the upcoming productions: The season opens with Bizet’s “Carmen” with a cast that includes Isabel Leonard and Carolyn Sproule alternating in the role of Carmen, Andrea Caré and Frederick Ballentine alternating as Don José, Anita {…}
In simplified terms, Wagner’s music, especially in “Tristan und Isolde,” can be visually compared to a continuous stream of waves coming and going, each growing in size and power, exploding, and then receding back to where they came from. In the best performances, a singer rides these orchestral waves of sound, the voice standing above the music, but also impossible {…}
(Credit: Fay Fox/Andrew Eccles/Simon Pauly/ Bree Anne Clowdus) The Richard Tucker Award is considered one of the most prestigious awards for American opera singers. Each year the Tucker foundation awards an American singer who is on the cusp of becoming a national and international star, with the hopes that the award acts as a well-timed catalyst to elevate the artist’s {…}
(Credit: Marty Sohl / Met Opera) Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2019, saw the third performance of Puccini’s “Turandot,” at the Metropolitan Opera this season. Set against the opulence of Zeffirelli’s 1987 production, the evening’s cast and ample chorus did much in bringing vocal and dramatic vitality to the forefront, with Maestro Yannick Nézet-Séguin making of the most of his particular gifts. A {…}
(Credit: Marty Sohl / Met Opera) The Met Opera’s Live in HD series for the 2019-20 season kicks off on Saturday, Oct. 12, 2019 with a transmission of Puccini’s “Turandot.” The broadcast, which kicks off 12:55 p.m. Eastern time, stars Christine Goerke in the title role, with Yusif Eyvazov, and Elenora Buratto as Calaf and Liù, respectively. The big story, {…}
(Credit: Marty Sohl / Met Opera) On Thursday, the Metropolitan Opera will open its fourth production of the season – Puccini’s “Turandot.” This run of performances is unique because they represent the first time that the Met Opera’s music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts an opera by Puccini at the famed house. To this point, he has tackled works by Bizet, {…}
(Credit: Hilary Scott) Let’s start stating – to me – the obvious. The cast that Tanglewood put together for its first complete performance of a Wagner opera could not reasonably be improved upon. Every voice was stunning in its own way. Every character from the hoary mythos was carefully and movingly delineated. The staging of this opera was simple yet {…}
Wagner’s “Die Walküre” is set to appear on Great Performances at the Met on August 12 at 12 p.m. The opera will feature Robert LePage’s famed production with Christine Goerke, Greer Grimsley, Stuart Skelton, Jamie Barton, Eva-Maria Wesbroek, and Günther Groissböck among the cast members. Philippe Jordan conducts the second installment in Wagner’s famed tetralogy. Of the opera’s opening performance, {…}
The White Lights Festival has announced its 2019 festival featuring numerous experimental works and a number of operatic and vocal evenings. For this article, we will only announce vocal events. “En Masse,” a work created by Yaron Lifschitz with the Circa Ensemble, is set to feature selections by Swedish composer Klara Lewis interspersed with selections from Schubert’s “Winterreise” and “Schwanengesang.” Performance {…}
The Dora Award nominations have been announced with the Canadian Opera leading the way. In the Outstanding Production category, the Canadian Opera’s production of “La Bohème,” “Hadrian,” “Otello,” and “Eugene Onegin” are nominated alongside “Kopernikus” for the Against the Grain Theatre. Meanwhile, in the Outstanding Performance by an Individual category, Angel Blue, Ambur Braid, Gerald Finley, Thomas Hampson, Tamara Wilson, {…}