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08 Apr 2005
Few tears will be shed for Riccardo Muti, who resigned last Saturday from La Scala, Milan, the opera house he has conducted with a baton of iron for the last 19 years. That’s quite long enough for anyone to be in the same job, and Muti’s prestige means that he can take his pick of offers from the international circuit — except perhaps Covent Garden, which is still smarting at his peremptory withdrawal from last October’s production of La Forza del Destino, apparently in protest over the insignificant alteration of a piece of scenery. »
07 Apr 2005
“Ein Affront, eine Beleidigung dieses Hauses und des Publikums, aber auch der Künstler” – so kommentierte Staatsoperndirektor Ioan Holender die Absage der Übertragung von Donizettis “Liebestrank” mit den Stars Anna Netrebko und Rolando Villazón durch den ORF. Holender hatte gegen die späte Sendezeit im Pfingstsamstags-Programm des ORF (Beginn 22.35h) protestiert und gefragt, ob die mit Netrebko geplante Übertragung der kommenden Salzburger Festspiel-”Traviata” auch zu so später Stunde gezeigt werden würde. ORF-Programmdirektor Scolik nahm daraufhin die “Liebestrank”-Sendung überhaupt aus dem Sende-Programm. »
05 Apr 2005
Not all operas are grand, full-blown theatrical events. There are many smaller, more intimate works, some called salon operas, meant to be performed, as the name implies, in intimate surroundings. Most of these smaller operas are far less well known than their super-size relations. »
03 Apr 2005
Die Musiker der Scala hatten ihren Chefdirigenten zuletzt mehrfach aufgefordert, das Haus zu verlassen. Muti sprach in seiner Rücktrittserklärung von einer “mir gegenüber offen zur Schau getragenen Feindseligkeit seitens Menschen, mit denen ich mehr als zwanzig Jahre zusammengearbeitet habe. Das macht eine Fortsetzung meiner Tätigkeit unmöglich.” »
03 Apr 2005
The escalating artistic arms race between London’s two rival opera houses, Covent Garden and the Coliseum, reached a new level of threat this weekend. »
03 Apr 2005
Depuis plusieurs mois, le climat est tendu au ballet de l’Opéra de Bordeaux. Il pourrait l’être davantage après la comparution, jeudi 31 mars, de son directeur et chorégraphe, Charles Jude, devant le tribunal correctionnel de Bordeaux, pour harcèlement moral. Cet ancien danseur étoile de l’Opéra de Paris, âgé de 51 ans, élève de Noureev, est poursuivi par Hélène Ballon, danseuse de 33 ans, soliste du ballet de Bordeaux. “Ce ne sont pas les qualités chorégraphiques de M. Jude qui sont mises en cause, mais son comportement”, précise Me Gérard Boulanger, l’avocat de la plaignante. »
02 Apr 2005
BILOXI – World-renowned tenor Placido Domingo, who sings tonight for a near sell-out audience at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum, had high praise Friday for the Hattiesburg-based youth orchestra that will accompany him. »
02 Apr 2005
MILAN (Reuters) – Riccardo Muti has resigned as the musical director of Milan’s La Scala after his 19-year reign at the opera house dissolved into a bitter battle for power, mutiny in the musical ranks and canceled performances. »
01 Apr 2005
When soprano Jessye Norman cancelled her appearance in the Michigan Opera Theatre’s world premiere of “Margaret Garner” next month, David DiChiera MOT general director admits it felt a lot like raindrops were falling on this head — and on his parade. »
29 Mar 2005
The BBC broadcast the first act of Wagner’s The Valkyrie live last night without telling viewers that the rest would be blacked out because the star, Bryn Terfel, had a sore throat. »
26 Mar 2005
For a New Yorker accustomed to watching the madcap dash to the exits that typically ensues as soon as a performance ends at the Metropolitan Opera, the relaxed pace and genteel protocols of opera-going in Copenhagen were a balm. »
26 Mar 2005
Leaflets distributed this week outside La Scala opera house in Milan announced the world premiere of “an opera of a few minutes (because that’s enough)”, composed by the theatre’s audience. The music consisted of loud heckling whenever members of La Scala’s orchestra appeared. The libretto was curt: “Don’t touch the maestro. Riccardo Muti belongs to art. He belongs to us!” »
25 Mar 2005
In all the years of its existence, the Golden Mask Festival has been nothing if not a study in contrasts—no other Russian festival embraces as fully the multiplicity of the performing arts. Once a year, for just over two weeks in the spring, the best Russian opera singers, ballet dancers, dramatic actors, directors, conductors, puppeteers and other sundry performing artists gather to show their stuff and compete for the coveted Golden Mask award. »
24 Mar 2005
As the limousines arrive at the premiere of an award winning film version of Carmen, U Carmen E Khayelitsha, they have to slow down for a group of barefooted children pushing shopping trolleys filled with scrap metal across the road. »
24 Mar 2005
MOSCOW, Russia (CNN)—Russia’s Bolshoi Theater has sparked outrage by putting on an opera that some lawmakers and a pro-Kremlin youth group say is pornographic.
The opera, “Rosenthal’s Children,” is about a scientist who clones five great classical composers—Tchaikovsky, Mozart, Wagner, Mussorgsky and Verdi.
The scientist then dies, and the cloned musicians—unprepared for life on their own in the 1990s—end up on the street. »
24 Mar 2005
A new wave of distinctive 21st-century concert halls is changing the look and feel of classical music performance in the U.S. These halls have impressive architectural pedigrees and price tags—Frank Gehry designed the $275 million Disney Hall in Los Angeles; Rafael Viñoly, the $265 million Kimmel Center in Philadelphia; Santiago Calatrava, the coming $300 million Atlanta Symphony Center. Most of them, like architect William Rawn’s $99 million Strathmore Music Center in Bethesda, Md., shun the gilded, red-velvet opulence of traditional European models in favor of Modernist simplicity. They also strive for heightened spatial intimacy between audience and performer: Disney Hall, home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, has terraced seating areas surrounding the stage. »
24 Mar 2005
FOUR operas, more than four reasons to go. The operas: Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, Péter Eötvös’s The Balcony, Wagner’s Parsifal, and Handel’s Semele.The reasons to go: great music, top performers, the best conductors, inventive directors, and two truly excellent performance spaces. »
23 Mar 2005
A month shy of the halfway point in the 26-month construction of its new Civic Center home, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music started the party early last week with a ceremony to “top out” the new building on Oak Street. »
22 Mar 2005
Soprano Susanna Phillips, a former Huntsville resident, is among the four top winners picked Sunday in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in New York.
Phillips won $15,000 toward her studies and eligibility to be considered for the Met’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. »
22 Mar 2005
Da ist einmal das quirlige künstleri sche Ego des neuen Mannes: Si mon Rattle, als Nachfolger Clau dio Abbados bei den Berliner Philharmoniker sozusagen naturgemäß auch Chef der Salzburger Osterfestspiele, ist schon von seinem Selbstverständnis her das Gegenteil des Festivalgründers Karajan. Der hatte 1967 die Idee, Richard Wagners Gesamtkunstwerk mit seinen Berliner Philharmonikern im Orchestergraben auf mustergültige Weise zu präsentieren, in eigenen Inszenierungen; eine Tragödie, ganz aus dem Geiste der Musik geboren, sozusagen. »
20 Mar 2005
THE opera world is eyeing two British-based conductors as potential saviours of La Scala opera house, which has cancelled this month’s programme amid a bitter power struggle and staff revolt. »
20 Mar 2005
THE ALARM BELLS SOUNDED A FEW weeks ago when Edinburgh International Festival director Brian McMaster put out the plea for a rescue package. Not only were there to be no late-night £5 concerts at this year’s festival – a series he has always said is politically desirable but financially extravagant – but he needed an additional six-figure sum simply to make the bare bones break even. That, essentially, is what he has given us in this year’s music programme – one main evening concert a night, three staged operas, and the usual daily diet of Queen’s Hall midday recitals. »
17 Mar 2005
March 16, 2005, New York, NY-The 39th season of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts’ Mostly Mozart Festival, which runs from July 28 to August 27, was announced today by Jane S. Moss, Vice President for Programming, and Music Director Louis Langrée. Now in his third season as Music Director, Maestro Langrée conducts the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra (MMFO) in 11 concerts of seven different programs during the Festival. This summer’s Festival will have a special focus on Mozart’s travels and influence in Paris, Prague, London, Italy, and Russia, which will be explored through MMFO concerts, programs with visiting ensembles, late-night concerts, and pre-concert events. Mostly Mozart will begin on Thursday, July 28 with Louis Langrée leading the MMFO in a performance featuring soprano Renée Fleming and pianist Stephen Hough at Avery Fisher Hall. This performance will be broadcast on Lincoln Center’s Emmy Award-winning series, Live From Lincoln Center. »
17 Mar 2005
Le directeur du Festival international d’art lyrique d’Aix-en-Provence, Stéphane Lissner, a dévoilé, mardi 15 mars, à Paris, le programme de la manifestation, qui aura lieu du 9 au 30 juillet. »
17 Mar 2005
Cincinnati Opera, on the move for the past half-dozen years, is not slowing down. Quite the opposite. The nation’s second oldest opera company appears to be speeding up. »
16 Mar 2005
Zum Start eine Strauss-Oper unter Kent Nagano, ein Rossini-Zyklus mit Ivor Bolton am Pult, eine deutliche Erweiterung des Sänger-Ensembles: Das alles wird erst ab 2006/ 07 passieren, ab der Ära Christoph Albrecht also. Doch zuvor erleben Münchens Opernfans die letzte Spielzeit unter der Ägide von Sir Peter Jonas, die insgesamt 13., eine “lucky number”, wie der Intendant findet. »
15 Mar 2005
Toronto—L’Opéra de Montréal plans to break with routine next year by presenting three operas the company has never done before. »
15 Mar 2005
Die Wiener Staatsoper hat ihre Abonnement-Preise erhöht. Zum Teil so kräftig, dass Musikfreunde nun für ihre Karten beinahe doppelt so viel bezahlen müssen wie bisher. Ein Proteststurm war die Folge, der auch viel Kritik an der künstlerischen Gebarung des Hauses einschloss. Direktor Ioan Holender wollte diese im Zuge der Debatte über die Preiserhöhungen nicht kommentieren, sondern verwies an seinen Geschäftsführer, Thomas Platzer. »
12 Mar 2005
Die empörten Stimmen in Mailand scheinen voll und ganz in die hef tige Polemik einzustimmen, die der Dirigent und musikalische Leiter der Mailänder Scala, Riccardo Muti, via Offenen Brief gegen die Belegschaft seines Hauses gerichtet hat. Orchester und Chor streiken seit Tagen aus Protest gegen die von Muti betriebene Ablöse des Scala-Intendanten Carlo Fontana. Deshalb musste am vergangenen Donnerstag die Premiere der neuen Oper “Il dissoluto assolto” aus der Feder des italienischen Komponisten Azio Corghi abgesagt werden. Die Aufführung dieses auf einem Text von Literatur-Nobelpreisträger Jose Saramago basierenden Stückes wäre die erste Uraufführung gewesen, die Riccardo Muti seit seinem Amtsantritt 1986 dirigiert hätte. »