Opera Today

In this country art and politics are rarely bedfellows — strange or otherwise; indeed, it’s seldom that the two meet under the same roof.

Regarded, until the modern vogue for earlier masters, as the senior surviving grand master of opera, Gluck never quite becomes fashionable and never quite vanishes.

There is no middle ground in War and Peace ó or, rather, itís all middle ground, like a battlefield, and you may feel as if every soldier in Russia (and in France) has marched over you.

Once upon a time, we used to only dream about a stellar pairing like Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu has fielded for their current offering on display: “La Cenerentola.”

Enough ink was spilled last year gushing over Valencia’s new Calatrava-designed opera house and Arts and Science park that I had been chomping at the bit for the opportunity to take in a performance there as soon as my availability and, more important, the availability of a still-very-hard-to-find ticket coincided.

Do we too easily take Richard Strauss for granted? The question is prompted by the superlative production of ìFrau ohne Schattenî that was the highlight of the fall season at the Chicago Lyric Opera.