http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/12/30/ap/entertainment/mainD8EQENSG3.shtml
Author: Gary Hoffman
Berg’s Wozzeck at the Met ó Three Reviews
The Metropolitan Opera presents Wozzeck, Alban Berg’s “operatic version of B¸chnerís play about a soldier who subjects himself to medical experiments to augment his pay.” Here are two reviews.
Mario Del Monaco at the Bolshoi
Myto has the good sense to call a spade a spade. This is an issue exclusively meant for the Del Monaco-crowd and not for people wanting a Carmen or a Pagliacci. The set has one enormous quality: a brilliant natural sound that hides nothing and doesnít change the balance of the voices.
Macabre, magical and magnificent
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2005/12/29/bthans29.xml&sSheet=/arts/2005/12/29/ixartleft.html
ENO changes tune on music director
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/news/story/0,11711,1674599,00.html
Barenboim hints at La Scala encore
http://www.guardian.co.uk/italy/story/0,12576,1674692,00.html?gusrc=rss
SCHREKER: Christophorus oder ìDie Vision einer Operî
How easy it might be to overlook this lesser-known Schreker opera, composed in 1928 and dedicated to Schrekerís good friend Arnold Schoenberg, here in its recorded debut. It has a quite curious libretto, complex and multilayered, and Schreker moves between what are at times quite disparate styles.
SPITZER & ZASLAW: The Birth of the Orchestra ó History of an Institution, 1650-1815
At a time when the press has made the public aware of the difficult circumstances that exist for the symphony orchestra in the United States, it is refreshing to find a book that demonstrates unequivocally the nature of that institution and, as a consequence, its power in culture.
GOUNOD: Faust
Faust, OpÈra en cinq actes
Music composed by Charles Gounod. Libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel CarrÈ after Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
A musical genius? No, Mozart was just a hard-working boy
With the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth just weeks away, the source of his brilliance is being disputed. Alice O’Keeffe reports