Recently in Commentary

Tom Moore Interviews Dimitri Cervo

Oct. 25, 2007, Sala Cecilia Meireles

I met the young gaucho composer Dimitri Cervo at the 2003 Bienal of Contemporary Music, where his works for solo flute and strings, Pattapiana [named for Pattapio Silva, a great Brazilian flutist who died tragically young at the beginning of the last century] made quite an impression.

Houston puts final touches on new Heggie opera

There’s still a hint of jest in the comparison, but it’s not without reason that Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally are mentioned now and then in opera circles as “the Strauss and Hofmannsthal of the 21st century.”

‘Polish’ Not Change for Santa Fe Opera

Incoming general director of Santa Fe Opera, Charles MacKay, has made clear he is “in the tradition -- I will not be an agent for radical change,” at the celebrated New Mexico summer opera festival, MacKay says.

Tom Moore Interviews Frederick Carrilho

Composer Frederick Carrilho was born in 1971 in the state of Sao Paulo, and has studied guitar and composition, most recently at UNICAMP in Campinas. His music has been heard at the recent biennial festivals of contemporary music in Rio, with the Profusão V – Toccata making a strong impression at the Bienal of 2007. We spoke in Portuguese.

Tom Moore Interviews Marisa Rezende

October 23, 2007, Sala Cecilia Meireles, Rio de Janeiro

Guanajuato Opera a document of Mexican history

What makes the first visit to Guanajuato’s Teatro Juárez breathtaking is the suddenness of the encounter.

Tom Moore Interviews Nikolai Brucher

Oct. 25, 2007, Rio de Janeiro.

Tom Moore Interviews José Orlando Alves

José Orlando Alves is a young composer, originally from Minas Gerais, but who spent many years in Rio de Janeiro, where he has been active for a decade with the composers’ collaborative, Preludio XXI.

The Pleasures of Presence — The Small Loudspeakers of Richard Sequerra

In the long ago, when the best source of music reproduction in the home was a handsome piece of furniture, fitted with hidden audio components, and usually called radio-phonographs, my family had one — from Avery Fisher I believe — that had among its controls a switch labeled ‘presence.’

An Interview with Canadian mezzo-soprano, Kimberly Barber.

Uncut with Canada’s Mistress of the trouser-role: the multifaceted Kimberly Barber.

Glimmerglass Opera 2007 — An Overview

Glimmerglass Opera is in a watershed year. With the departure of Paul Kellogg, who had considerable success developing that annual festival, General and Artistic Director Michael Macleod has chosen to begin his tenure with a variation on the usual four-opera-season, namely a thematic collection of pieces based on the “Orpheus” legend. “Don’t look back” is the marketing catch phrase.

Jan Neckers on Recently Reissued Historicals

Almost thirty years ago a century old tradition ended with the last performance of I Maestri Cantatori.

Santa Fe Opera in Changing Times

Santa Fe Opera’s announcement August 10 that English-born impresario, Richard Gaddes, General Director of the company since 2001, will retire at the end of season 2008, took the local opera community by surprise.

The Week that Was for Opera: Santa Fe — Dallas — Denver/St Louis — Toronto

The week just ended was certainly of historic moment in the world of North American opera companies.

Countertenor David DQ Lee: Winning Hearts and Minds at Cardiff Singer of the World

Perhaps it is a sign that, at last, the countertenor voice has come of age in the hearts and minds of both audiences and the opera establishment.

New Frocks for Old – Cardiff Singer of the World, 2007

Back in the early 1980’s two good ideas came to fruition: the much-needed new concert hall for Cardiff, capital city of Wales, and plans to hold within it the first “Singer of the World” competition.

Opera on the move at Spoleto USA

Charleston, S.C. — For over 20 years it was two operas a season here at Spoleto USA, the all-arts festival brought to this cultural capital of the Old South by Gian Carlo Menotti in 1977.

Rising to the occasion – Michael Maniaci saves the day at La Fenice

It is every young opera singer’s dream.

SANTA FE TO CHANGE MUSIC DIRECTORS

On May 9th, when Santa Fe Opera finally announced that Alan Gilbert had left his post as Music Director of that company, a long-standing rumor was made official.

Kelly Kaduce sings Anna Karenina

Robert Gierlach wishes he could rewrite “Anna Karenina,” the Tolstoi whopper turned into an opera by librettist Colin Graham and composer David Carlson. It’s not that Gierlach, who sings Vronsky in the world premiere of the work at Florida Grand Opera on April 28, has misgivings about the author’s artistry; he simply wishes that the story could have a happy ending.

OPERA TODAY ARCHIVES »

Commentary

G. F. Handel
10 Dec 2005

HANDEL'S GIULIO CESARE

Giulio Cesare in Egitto was the fifth of the full-length operas composed by Handel for London’s Royal Academy of Music, the opera company founded in 1719 by a group of noblemen with the objective of staging Italian opera seria.

Brian Robins [Goldberg No. 35]

Giulio Cesare in Egitto was the fifth of the full-length operas composed by Handel for London’s Royal Academy of Music, the opera company founded in 1719 by a group of noblemen with the objective of staging Italian opera seria.

From the outset the grandeur and scale of Giulio Cesare, first given at the King’s Theatre, Haymarket on 20 February 1724, ensured a popular success reflected not only by London revivals in January 1725, January 1730 and February 1732, but by the opera rapidly being taken up in Germany, where it was performed in a number of centres including Brunswick (August 1725) and Hamburg (November 1725).

Click here for remainder of article.

Send to a friend

Send a link to this article to a friend with an optional message.

Friend's Email Address: (required)

Your Email Address: (required)

Message (optional):