“After Benjamin Britten,” the title continues. Thus a twentieth century masterpiece was reduced to its twenty-first century essentials — six singers, three keyboards, percussion, a platform and a sail. The…
Author: Michael Milenski
Don Giovanni in Aix
The late, justly mourned Pierre Audi, general director of the Aix Festival for these last seven festivals, matched renowned conductors and stage directors to create monumental stagings of the gamut…
Mozart’s La scuola degli amanti in Lyon
Ossia Cosi fan tutti, as you never could have possibly imagined it. French stage director Marie-Éve Signeyrole flipped the opera’s two titles, setting the second of the Mozart / DaPonte…
Manon in Paris
Les années folles in France [the roaring twenties in the USA] brought dancer Josephine Baker to Paris with her Bal Negre. In more recent times, the 2020 the Covid infection…
Idomeneo in San Francisco
To make a long story short, Ilia loves Idamande but can’t admit it. Elektra loves Idamante and admits it. Idomeneo loves his son Idamante but promised Neptune that he would…
La bohème in San Francisco [2025]
La bohème has played in forty-eight of San Francisco Opera’s 102 seasons. In fact, back in 1923 it was the inaugural piece of this grand old American opera company. Here’s…
Harvey Milk Reimagined at San Francisco’s Opera Parallèle
Recalling a very dark moment in San Francisco’s history, Michael Korie and Stewart Wallace’s Harvey Milk Reimagined [for small operatic forces], arrived, via St. Louis, finally in San Francisco. This…
Madama Butterfly in Williamsburg
Minimalism in the Commonwealth of Virginia — an iconic opera in rarefied format achieved a powerful presence. Maestro Jorge Parodi’s orchestra of single winds, two horns, strings 3,2,1,2,1, piano, timpani…
Zorro in San Jose [CA]
It was only a matter of time — first a novella (1917), a pulp magazine series (1919-1954), a few high profile movies (1920, 1940, 1998), a TV series (1957), a…
La forza del destino in Lyon
Each early spring the Opéra national de Lyon imagines three operas within a vague thematic framework to comprise its Winter Festival. This year the theme is “Se saisir de l’avenir”…