Harvey Milk Reimagined at San Francisco’s Opera Parallèle

Recalling a very dark moment in San Francisco’s history, Michael Korie and Stewart Wallace’s Harvey Milk Reimagined [for small operatic forces], arrived, via St. Louis, finally in San Francisco. This…

Madama Butterfly in Williamsburg

Minimalism in the Commonwealth of Virginia — an iconic opera in rarefied format achieved a powerful presence. Maestro Jorge Parodi’s orchestra of single winds, two horns, strings 3,2,1,2,1, piano, timpani…

Zorro in San Jose [CA]

It was only a matter of time — first a novella (1917), a pulp magazine series (1919-1954), a few high profile movies (1920, 1940, 1998), a TV series (1957), a…

La forza del destino in Lyon

Each early spring the Opéra national de Lyon imagines three operas within a vague thematic framework to comprise its Winter Festival. This year the theme is “Se saisir de l’avenir”…

L’Avenir nous le dira and 7 Minutes in Lyon

The first a premiere, the second of recent vintage. Both constructed on count downs (the first, one hour, the second, two hours) — thus the Opéra de Lyon’s Winter Festival…

Rusalka in Marseille

It was a fairly straight forward Rusalka, even though it took place at an on-stage Olympic style swimming pool, somewhere. Rusalka did kill the prince with a spear fishing gun,…

Das Rheingold in Paris

Any Calixto Bieito production is news, but it is great big news when he takes on the first installment of opera’s notorious four opera cycle, Der Ring des Nibelungen. The…

I Puritani in Paris

Bellini’s tenth and last opera, I Puritani, took Paris by storm in 1835. Judging from the wild applause and standing ovation just now, it has lost none of its appeal…

Castor et Pollux in Paris

Just when you thought DEI (Diversity, Equality, Inclusion) was dead, American stage director Peter Sellers brazenly enlisted 16 highly trained (various cool, pop styles) dancers of color from America, France…

Verdi’s Giovanna d’Arco in Parma

The least performed of the Verdi oeuvre, not included in the Verdi canon, Giovanna d’arco (Joan of Arc) was given another chance just now on one of Italy’s famed Verdi…