(Credit: Arielle Doneson) The Atlanta Opera is set to premiere Tomer Zvulun’s new production of “Salome” on Jan. 25, 2020. The work will star Jennifer Holloway in her U.S. title role debut with Arthur Fagen conducting. Holloway has turned “Salome” into one of her signature roles, performing it in Dreseden, Mannheim, Leipzig, Bilbao, and England’s Opera North. Nathan Berg will {…}
On December 21, 2019, the Eurasia Festival presented the second concert of its Park Avenue Concert Series. Held at the organization’s new location of the Eurasia Cultural Center, this series gives performance opportunities to students of the “Azatt Sessions,” a series of classes taught by director Mark Verzatt and Eurasia Festival President and pianist, Aza Sydykov. A Tenor Opens Opening {…}
(Photo Credit: Kevin Yatarola) On November 26, 2019, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall was host to the latest iteration of its Great Performers series. This installment saw Czech mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená joined by a number of distinguished artists, including Simon Rattle, violinists Giovanni Guzzo and Rahel Maria Rilling, violist Amihai Grosz, cellist David Adorjan, flutist Kaspar Zehnder and clarinetist Andrew {…}
The Spoleto Festival USA has announced its 2019 season, which will feature one major opera production, among other performances. The festival will open with a production of Strauss’ “Salome.” The famed opera will be directed by Patrice Caurier and Mosh Leiser, with the intention of setting the work in a present-day city. It will be the duo’s ninth year with {…}
On June 26, 2018, bidders at the Nat D. Sanders Auctions will have the chance to go home with a piece of opera history. The item is question is the manuscript for the finale of Richard Strauss’ 1935 opera “Die schweigsame Frau,” or “The Silent Woman.” The opera itself was the subject of controversy in the 1930s due to Richard {…}
The aftermath of Hurricane Harvey forced the Houston Grand Opera out of its regular space in the Wortham Theater Center and into a temporary one, dubbed HGO Resilience Theater inside the cavernous George Brown Convention Center in downtown. Experiencing a performance in such an unusual setting wasn’t a unique experience for me after seeing a production of “Tannhauser” inside a {…}
“Ariadne auf Naxos” is among the more popular Strauss works in the canon, its status the result of its glorious and lush melodies that accompany its passionate love duet. But the opera as we know it today was not the way it was originally conceived. The version that premiered on Oct. 25, 1912, was actually little more than a 30-minute {…}
Cheryl Studer, one of the most unique sopranos in recent history. Born on Oct. 24, 1955, she put together an enviable career that ranged from singing a tremendous amount of opera roles as dramatic and lyric soprano and then mezzo, to winning a plethora of major awards, to eventually becoming a teacher. She recorded countless albums and her legacy is {…}
San Francisco Opera’s “Elektra” is a powerhouse! From the minute the curtain rises on the “Museum Elektra,” filled with the artifacts of the Greek age and styled with an array of modern visitors, complete with cell phones and baseball caps, one strange dark-haired woman skulking around from this case to that, defying the Guards who monitor the whole scene until {…}
It may be wondered why Strauss decided to write an opera about the relative merits of the words and music in opera: “prima la musica o prima le parole?” Although it is a debate as old as opera itself, it is hardly a subject that is likely to excite potential audiences, and it is no doubt one of the reasons {…}
Richard Strauss, born on June 11, 1864, is one of opera’s greatest composers. And many of his operas, including “Elektra,” “Salome,” “Der Rosenkavalier,” “Die Frau ohne Schatten,” and “Ariadne auf Naxos,” are major repertoire staples. Others still get occasional performances, including “Arabella,” “Capriccio,” and “The Egyptian Helen.” But there are still others that for whatever reason simply never made the cut {…}