Music of life-affirming vigour, then chilling intensity was the focus of this curious juxtaposition from the Budapest Festival Orchestra under its founding director Iván Fischer. The unalloyed joy of Beethoven’s…
Category: Performances
Fine musical performances redeem this revival of Glyndebourne’s Kátya Kabanová
A winged angel, multiple birdcages and confining walls of brilliant white dominate this symbol-heavy staging of Kátya Kabanová, a production first unveiled by Damiano Michieletto at Glyndebourne in 2021. A few…
Proms 2025: Boulez and Mahler’s Das klagende Lied
For my generation, as well as for me personally, Pierre Boulez’s Mahler was probably the most influential of all. My Mahlerian coming of age coincided with his decisive return to…
Proms 2025: An Unremarkable Mahler Resurrection from the Hallé and Kahchun Wong
The Singaporean-born conductor Kahchun Wong is certainly a fascinating one based on this performance of Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony. A winner of the Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition (2016), where he conducted…
Proms 2025: Berio’s Sinfonia in a compelling performance with the CBSO and Kazuki Yamada
Is Berio’s Sinfonia a masterpiece, or a work of its time that today seems outdated? Written in 1968 during a time of revolution it is not in itself a work…
Das Rheingold and Die Walküre in Bayreuth
The first two of this fourth edition of the 2022 Bayreuth Ring des Nibelungen, staged by Valentin Schwarz, with the understanding that the Bayreuth Festival mounts a new Ring every…
Canto Virginia Delights Audiences of All Ages with Outreach Performance Who’s Afraid of Opera?
Outreach performances are often viewed as a rite of passage for young aspiring opera singers, in many cases involving travel to schools for 8 A.M. assembly performances. The advantage Canto…
Back to the Future: Verdi’s Macbeth at Teatro Nuovo
Big American opera companies in America today resemble Broadway companies. They strive to fill gargantuan theaters by serving up a mix of warhorses and crossover repertoire, staged by celebrity directors,…
Berlin Staatsoper’s poignant re-interpretation of Strauss’s comedy Die schweigsame Frau
Die schweigsame Frau (1935) was Strauss’s only collaboration with Stefan Zweig – a writer as prominent and satisfactory for the composer to work with as Hugo von Hofmannsthal had been…
Canto Vocal Programs Hosts A Romantic Evening With “The Love Concert”
Mere hours after the wonderful morning outreach performance last Saturday, the singers of Canto Virginia 2025 performed a larger, more formal concert with the theme of love. Canto Vocal Programs…