Turandot in San Francisco

The magnificent David Hockney Turandot production burst again onto the War Memorial stage with a new cast and conductor that recaptured its potential to make this fairytale into great opera.

Lucia di Lammermoor, Chicago

Lyric Opera of Chicago staged Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di
Lammermoor
as its second production of the current season with Susanna
Phillips taking on the role of the heroine torn between romantic love and familial pressures.

Tricks and Treats, New World Symphony

If this generation were to stake a claim to its own classical vocal music “Golden Age,” Christine Brewer presents a strong case.

Eugene Onegin, ENO

Deborah Warner’s new production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin is an evocative and lyrical depiction of elegiac passion.

Dark Sisters, New York

They’re no longer just door-to-door missionaries with a science fiction theology and strange underwear! What with a presidential candidacy and a hit Broadway musical, the Mormons are having their breakout season in New York.

Carmen in San Francisco

DÈja vu. Well, sort of. Last time around (2006) there was a Carmen and then another who canceled leaving San Francisco Opera in the lurch.

Adriana Lecouvreur, Carnegie Hall

What could be more appropriate for the Samhain season than a return from
near-death?

Tales of Hoffmann, Chicago

For its first production of the new season, Jacques Offenbach’s
Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Lyric Opera of Chicago assembled a
distinguished roster of soloists with the Lyric Opera Orchestra under the direction of Emmanuel Villaume.

RomÈo et Juliette, LA

Love and gloom at the Los Angeles Opera.

La sonnambula, Royal Opera

Bellini’s La sonnambula does not have the most gripping or
convincing of opera plots: a young girl sleepwalks into a stranger’s room, where she is discovered by her fiancÈ; disbelieving her pleas of innocence, he jilts her and plans to wed another; but, she is vindicated when she is spied on a nocturnal wander, and the lovers are reconciled.