The Verbier Festival has announced the programming for its 26th edition. While there are undeniably a plethora of incredible performances of all kinds to be found throughout the many weeks of this famed festival, the aim of this article will be to focus mainly on vocal and operatic performances. Baritone Thomas Quasthoff will appear alongside guitarist Wolfgang Meyer and Trombonist {…}
The Verbier Festival has announced its 2019 festival with two opera performances and a number of recitals and concerts featuring some of the greatest singers in the world. For this season announcement we will only include the vocal performances. Program Thomas Quastoff headlines a concert entitled “Meeting Friends” with Wolfgang Meyer and Shawn Grocott. Performance Date: July 19, 2019 Jakub {…}
Karita Mattila has announced that she will sing in Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde.” The Finnish soprano announced via Twitter that she had signed a contract to do her first Isolde. The tweet stated, “I LOVE it! I love these imaginative thoughts. I completely had an ‘awakening’ with Ring in San Fran last summer, meaning: WAGNER. The ‘complicated relationship’ was over {…}
When you look at Finland’s musical landscape, you will undeniably see a number of talented opera singers. But none rises above the stature of Karita Mattila. Born on Sept. 5, 1960, the Finnish soprano graduated from the Sibelius Academy in 1983, the same year that she won the first Cardiff Singer of the World Competition and cemented her status as {…}
This summer, the San Francisco Opera will present Richard Wagner’s “Der Ring des Nibelungen” in three complete cycles. The company will showcase each cycle over the course of one week as the composer originally intended, from June 12 through July 1 at the War Memorial Opera House. The cast is set to include some of today’s greatest Wagnerians including Irene Theorin (Brünnhilde), Greer {…}
The Den Norske Opera has announced its upcoming 2018-19 season featuring a wide range of repertoire and rising stars as well as some of the leading Norwegian singers in the world. Here is a look. Productions The season will open with Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” and Enrique Mazzola conducting Richard Jones’s production. Johannes Weisser, Jakob Bloch Jespersen, Brigitte Christensen, and Anthony Gregory star {…}
The ongoing partnership between the Bay Area’s Classical KDFC and San Francisco Opera will continue on April 1 with a broadcast of Leoš Janáček’s “Jenůfa.” The performance, which was recorded live at the War Memorial Opera House in June 2016, features Finnish soprano Karita Mattila as Kostelnička, Swedish soprano Malin Byström in the title role, American tenor William Burden as {…}
The Metropolitan Opera has announced its 2018-19 season. Here is a rundown. New Productions The Metropolitan Opera opens with Saint-Saëns’ “Samson et Dalila” in a new production by Darko Tresnjak. Roberto Alagna and Elina Garanca reunite for the production which is also set to star Laurent Naouri, Elchin Azizov, and Dmitry Belosselskiy. Anita Rachevlishvili and Aleksandrs Antonenko will sing a {…}
The 2018-19 Paris Opera will celebrate a double anniversary including the signing, in 1669, of the letters patent authorizing Perrin to establish an Academy of Opera – rapidly named the Royal Academy of Music and that of the inauguration of the Opéra Bastille in 1989. The season will feature a number of new productions, classic revivals, and world premieres. It {…}
The International Opera Award nominations have bee announced. The organization, which seeks to recognize the best of the industry recognizes 18 categories. This year the nominees for Female Singer are Malin Byström, Carmen Giannattasio, Barbara Hannigan, who recently won the Grammy, Hui He, Ermonela Jaho and Eva-Maria Westbroek. In the Male Singer category, Piotr Beczała is nominated alongside Günther Groissböck, Peter Mattei, Eric Owens, {…}
The Canadian Opera Company has announced its 2018-19 season filled with numerous classics and a world premiere. And there is also a major surprise. As in previous years, the season will include six productions divided into three pairs, for the fall, winter and spring seasons. The season will open on Sept. 30, 2018, with “Eugene Onegin” in Robert Carsen’s classic {…}