The Houston Symphony Orchestra has announced its 2024-25 Season. Here are the vocal performances for the season. Juraj Valčuha conducts Bartok’s “Bluebeard’s Castle” with Gábor Bretz and Ekaterina Gubanova. The program also includes Britten and Prokofiev. Performance Dates: Feb. 15 & 16, 2025 Andrés Orozco-Estrada conducts a program of music by Strauss and Brahms. The soloists are Hilary Hahn and the Houston Symphony Chorus. {…}
Opéra de Paris has announced a cast change for its production of “Don Quichotte.” The company announced that Ildebrando d’Arcangelo has withdrawn from the production. As a result, the role of Don Quichotte will be performed by Gábor Bretz for the performances on June 1, 5, 8, and 11, 2024. Bretz performs regularly with the Hungarian State Opera, the Wagner Festival, the {…}
“Oh my!” is how one would headline, exasperatingly, the sordid, crude, and entirely inappropriate production of “Tosca” at Vienna’s Theater an der Wien. Severed limbs, some sort of nuclear winter, and an orgy of on-stage violence and sex – the premises to Martin Kušej’s vision of the Puccini melodrama could not be more grotesque and, in essence, detrimental to the {…}
(Photo: SF/Monika Rittershaus) Bohuslav Martinů’s opera “The Greek Passion” is a work still in search of its audience. The opera, seldom performed, is considered to be one of Martinů’s finest compositions. This season’s Salzburg Festival tried hard to make “The Greek Passion” a rare and visually noteworthy production. But it didn’t quite work out. The opera’s political radicalness and musical accomplishments are {…}
Belgium’s La Monnaie du Mont has announced its 2023-24 season with world premieres, a new Ring Cycle, and many classic works. The season opens with the world premiere of Bernard Foccroulle and Matthew Jocelyn’s “Cassandra.” Kazushi Ono conducts the work with a cast that includes Katarina Bradic Jessica Niles Susan Bickley, Sarah Defrise, Paul Appleby, Joshua Hopkins, and Gidon Saks. {…}
The Salzburg Festival has announced its 2023 season featuring operas, concerts, recitals, and Mozart programs. Opera Raphaël Pichon will conduct Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro” in a new production by Martin Kušej. Andrè Schuen, Adriana González, Sabine Devieilhe, Krzysztof Bączyk, and Lea Desandre star. Performance Dates: July 27-August 28, 2023 Verdi’s “Macbeth” will be conducted by Franz Welser-Möst and directed {…}
Photo: Bernd Uhlig Ingo Metzmacher, the conductor for this year’s Aix-en-Provence festival’s production of Strauss’ “Salome” stressed time and again throughout his program notes the need for a cool head, for orchestral restraint and calm, for sobriety and balance. His stated aim was to ensure the orchestra does not predominate, does not get carried away, is not too loud, but {…}
(Photo: Clive Barda) David Alden’s 2018 production of “Lohengrin,” Wagner’s hokey fable of love, fidelity, and politics, is receiving its first revival from Peter Relton at the Royal Opera House. Alden’s setting is generic postwar Europe, all bombed out windows and bare brick, with buildings at precariously jaunty angles (sets by Paul Steinberg). In the ruins of this world Konig {…}
Müpa Budapest has announced its 2022-23 season featuring a number of concerts and great artists. Here is a look at the vocal performances of the season. Musical Stage Aapo Häkkinen conducts Schubert’s “Alfonso und Estrella” with Patrick Grahl, Lydia Teuscher, Krešimir Stražanac, Johannes Weisser, and Arttu Kataja. Performance Dates: Nov. 17, 2022 Nikolas Nägele conducts the Bel Canto Aria evening {…}
The Hungarian state Opera has announced its 2022-23 season featuring premieres and repertory staples. Here is a look at the extensive season. Premieres Puccini’s “Tosca” will be conducted by Gergely Kesselyák and will star Csilla Boross and Zsuzsanna Ádám in the title role. The cast will be rounded by Attila Fekete, Adorján Pataki, Péter Kálmán, and Michele Kalmandy. Performance Dates: {…}
(Credit: Monika Rittershaus) The Theater an der Wien’s production of Puccini’s “Tosca” is set to be broadcast on ORF2 on Jan 28, 2022. The new production by Martin Kušej is currently starring Kristine Opolais in the title role, Jonathan Tetelman as Cavaradossi, and Gábor Bretz as Scarpia. Marc Albrecht conducts the production. Myfidelio will also stream the opera at 21:20 {…}