A massive antique Roman theater where stadium opera is always grand opera and often good opera as well.
Year: 2013
A Very Real Traviata
Conductor Leo Hussein, like many of the artists in the production, was making his debut. His take on the story was immediately ascertainable when he played parts of the overture with an earthy tone. This was Violetta’s world, where otherwise refined men wined, dined, and cavorted with the most expensive Parisian courtesans.
Verdi at the Old MET
With celebrations of the Verdi Bicentennial in full swing, there have been
many grumblings about the precarious state of Verdi singing in the world’s
major opera houses today.
Coleridge Taylor: The Song of Hiawatha, Three Choirs Festival
The Song of Hiawatha, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor at Gloucester Cathedral, highlight of this year’s Three Choirs Festival.
Italo Montemezzi: L’amore dei tre re
In the thirty-five years immediately following its American premiËre at the Metropolitan Opera in 1914, Italo Montemezzi’s ‘Tragic Poem in Three Acts’ L’amore dei tre re was performed in New York on sixty-six occasions.†
CosÏ fan tutte from DG
Few operas inspire the kind of competing affection and controversy that have surrounded Mozart’s CosÏ fan tutte almost since its first performance in Vienna in 1790.†
Glimmerglass’s handsomely staged ‘Passions’ expands the boundaries of oratorio
The double-bill program of sacred vocal works uses choreography, sets and costumes to heighten the drama within the music
Heart’s Delight: The Songs of Richard Tauber
During his career in film, opera, and operetta, Richard Tauber (1891 – 1948) enjoyed the sort of global fame that eludes all but the tiniest handful of ‘serious’ singers today.
Prom 20: Wagner — Gˆtterd‰mmerung
By the end of the first act, I was convinced that, barring a catastrophe of, well, Gˆtterd‰mmerung-like proportions, this would now turn out to be the greatest Ring since Bernard Haitink’s 1998 Royal Opera performances— also semi-staged, also at the Royal Albert Hall.