English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.
Conductor Oliver Zeffman has commissioned the very first opera for a socially distanced world, which is now available to watch exclusively on Apple Music. Eight Songs From Isolation has been written by eight leading composers, specifically for streaming - rather than live performance - and is the first opera written for a time when the performers were unable to meet in person.
Leading freelance musicians unite in Parliament Square to call for targeted support for colleagues in the arts and entertainment sector.
Duo Lewis Murphy (composer) and Laura Attridge (writer) have launched a charitable song project entitled Notes From Isolation. The resulting songs, featuring some of the UK's top singing talent, are being released online between August and October 2020 and can be enjoyed free of charge.
The Royal Opera House is thrilled to announce an exciting, wide-ranging new line-up for its autumn programme. For the first time, extraordinary performances will be accessible online for a global audience through livestreams and for socially distanced live audiences at our home in Covent Garden. In a global first, we present a new opera in hyper-reality, alongside repertory favourites from both artistic companies.
Some of the most famous and outstanding stars from the opera world are to take part in a very special evening from Wexford Festival Opera, including Aigul Akhmetshina, Joseph Calleja, Daniela Barcellona, Juan Diego Flórez, Igor Golovatenko, Ermonela Jaho, Sergey Romanovsky, and many more.
Following its successful launch in 2019, OperaStreaming streams nine operas on YouTube from the historic opera houses of Emilia-Romagna during the 2020-21 season, with fully-staged productions of Verdi's La traviata in October from Modena and Verdi'sOtello from Bologna in...
‘A brief history of song’ is the subtitle of the 2020 Oxford Lieder Festival (10th-17th October), which will present an ambitious, diverse and imaginative programme of 40 performances and events.
Bampton Classical Opera returns to the Baroque splendour of London’s St John’s Smith Square on November 6 with a concert performance of Gluck’s one-act opera The Crown, the first in the UK since 1987. The performance will also be filmed and available to watch on demand on the Bampton website from 9 November.
While many of us spent lockdown at home taking it a little easier, composer Andrew Synnott wrote an opera.
Owen Wingrave is part of the new Interim Season of 19 brand new events, all free to view online between September and December 2020.
The Arts Council has awarded innovative UK charity Music and Theatre For All (MTFA) a major new grant to develop three ambitious new projects in the wake of Covid 19.
English National Opera (ENO) will reopen the London Coliseum to socially distanced audiences on 6 and 7 November for special performances of Mozart’s Requiem. These will provide audiences with an opportunity to reflect upon and to commemorate the difficulties the nation has faced during the pandemic.
The Royal Opera House is proud to continue its curated #OurHouseToYourHouse programme into the autumn, bringing audiences the best of the ROH through a new series of Friday Premieres and cultural highlights.
After six months of closure, the Royal Opera House is thrilled to be opening its doors to the public as part of Open House London weekend, giving visitors a taste of one of the world’s most famous theatres for free.
The Academy of St Martin in the Fields is thrilled to announce re:connect - an eight concert series with live socially distanced audiences at its namesake church, St. Martin-in-the-Fields. The autumn concerts will take place at 5pm & 7:30pm on two Saturdays per month with guest artists including baritone Roderick Williams, soprano Carolyn Sampson and composer-conductor-pianist Ryan Wigglesworth performing a wide range of repertoire.
Music and poetry unite and collide across centuries, from the Medieval to the Enlightenment to the present day. This year, the Oxford Lieder Festival will present a thrilling and innovative programme comprising more than forty events streamed over eight days.
The English Concert with artistic director Harry Bicket is delighted to announce a series of concerts from 1-15 October 2020. The concerts take place in historic London venues with star soloists and will be performed and streamed live to a paying audience at 7pm GMT on each performance date. The programmes include first-class vocal and instrumental works from the two pillars of the English Baroque, covering different aspects of the repertoire.
Glyndebourne has announced plans for a ‘staycation’ series of socially-distanced indoor performances, starting on 10 October 2020.
The Royal Opera House is delighted to announce two packed evenings of opera and ballet, live from our stage in Covent Garden and available to view wherever you are in the world online.
Among the tributes that came to the legendary Producer, Designer and Director Franco Zeffirelli, in the remaining days of this past March, a little gem of a celebration was held at the Lincoln Triangle Barnes and Noble bookstore, on the evening of March 28th.
The event, which was free to the public, included an up-close interview with Franco Zeffirelli, performances from his Metropolitan Opera colleagues, and a signing of a limited edition of a hagiographical book about his Met productions as well as other vast memorabilia that documents the career of the award-winning producer and director of opera, theatre, film and television.
Franco Zeffirelli interviewed by Ira Siff
Franco Zeffirelli entered the reception to a standing ovation from his fans, friends, and colleagues. Among audience attendees was the former General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera, Joseph Volpe, who had a long, successful collaboration with Franco Zeffirelli, at the Met. The press coverage was vast and extended to the Italian news media. Independent film Director Abel Ferrara had his film crew cover the entire event for a documentary he is shooting on Franco Zeffirelli. Then the fabulous voices of the Metropolitan Opera house came, both old and new. Aprile Millo was the gracious hostess and a longtime friend of Franco Zeffirelli, with whom she had many memorable performances with at the Metropolitan Opera house.
Marcello Giordani performing Nessun Dorma from Turandot.
Marcello Giordani performed the aria Nessun Dorma magnificently, dedicated to both Franco Zeffirelli and to the late Luciano Pavarotti. Later, Marcello Giordani joined Aprile Millo for the love duet from Act I of Tosca. Their voices were golden and clearly gave flight to Franco Zeffirelli’s visions of opera. Baritone Mark Delavan performed as well to the delight of the audience. The performances were followed by an interview with Ira Siff. Franco Zeffirelli, as he settled into the sage green chair that awaited him, spoke fondly of intriguing memories and kept the audience captivated in the style of all Zeffirelli productions.
Diane Malone © 2008
All photos: © Caroline P. Digonis 2008.
[Reprinted by permission of the author from Metroway — The Online Guide to Everything New York.]
Aprile Millo and Marcello Giordani
performing from Tosca.