Macbeth and the darkness Madrid Teatro Real 11/10/2004 – Giuseppe Verdi: Macbeth Carlos álvarez (Macbeth), Paoletta Marrocu (Lady Macbeth), Aquiles Machado (Macduff), Guillermo Orozco (Malcolm), Carlo Colombara (Banquo). Orchestra and…
Category: Performances
Handel’s Semele at the ENO
Semele Robert Thicknesse at the Coliseum [Times Online, 20 November 2004] IT HAS to be the Prince of Wales’s favourite opera. “Nature to each allots his proper sphere,” avers Congreve’s…
Tosca at Graz
bq. Boris Trajanov, Evan Bowers and Marquita Lister Opernhaus Graz’s new production of Tosca is a hit. According to Larry Lash of the Financial Times, bq. A stage direction in…
The Cunning Little Vixen at the Chicago Lyric
If ‘Vixen’ can find its balance, it’ll be a charmer November 19, 2004 BY WYNNE DELACOMA Classical Music Critic Somewhere amid the nonstop bustle onstage and the flood of highly…
Le Monde Reviews La Traviata at La Fenice: High Praise for Cast — Carsen’s Production a Cliché
La Fenice refaite à neuf lance sa saison avec une “Traviata” façon années 1970 LE MONDE | 17.11.04 | 18h19 Le théâtre vénitien, rénové après l’incendie de 1996, présente l’œuvre…
WSJ Reviews Le Grande Macabre and The Flying Dutchman at the SFO
Waiting for the End of the World
By HEIDI WALESON [WSJ]
November 17, 2004
San Francisco
Many listeners know Gyorgy Ligeti from the creepily futuristic orchestral music in the soundtrack of the 1968 movie “2001: A Space Odyssey.” His opera “Le Grand Macabre” (1978, revised in 1996), given its American premiere this month by the San Francisco Opera, is a thoroughly different creature, yet it is just as much an artifact of its time. Though carefully crafted and full of compositional references, the score is mostly an elbow-in-the-ribs accompaniment to a nihilistic black comedy. Beginning with an opening fanfare for car horns that sounds like Harpo Marx multiplied and continuing with a parody of the “Dies Irae,” the prophecy of the Day of Judgment, the opera is a soulless and often scatological joke.
I Puritani at Baltimore Opera
More than meeting Bellini’s demands Baltimore company sings ‘I Puritani’ with polish, precision and control By Tim Smith Sun Music Critic November 15, 2004 Bel canto – “beautiful singing.” It’s…
Le Figaro Reviews La Traviata at La Fenice: Praises Ciofi, But Not Much Else
Verdi à Las Vegas Venise : de notre envoyé spécial Jacques Doucelin [15 novembre 2004] Un de ces chats comme Venise en a le secret, trone impérial et méprisant au…
SFO Presents The Flying Dutchman
With a ghoulishly murky ‘Dutchman,’ Opera puts on a truly grim production Joshua Kosman, Chronicle Music Critic Friday, November 12, 2004 It was, yes, a dark and stormy night as…