Italian soprano, Carmen Giannattasio, embodied Minnie’s swaggering authority. When the first chords of Puccini’s opera set in the Californian gold rush – La fanciulla del West – rang out in Bologna you could be forgiven for thinking you had turned up at a...
The Met orchestra struck up The Star-Spangled Banner. It is a venerated tradition to sing the American national anthem – adopted in the US as recently as 1931 – at the opening of the Met season. The Lincoln Center’s 3,800 capacity crowd rose as one and sang...
Jove went rogue. He had been trolling the glam nymph Calisto, one of goddess Diana’s followers, below. On earth. Enraptured by her pouting Instagram selfies. Failing miserably. Not even an encouraging emoji for his troubles. Her vow of chastity held out. No first-time...
“Here we are again!”. The catchline of 19th century English music hall star, comedian, drag artist and singer Dan Leno, given a leading role in Kevin Puts’ opera, Elizabeth Cree, about The Limehouse Golem. Cheery subject for an upstate New York...
Nowhere transforms the English countryside into fairyland better than Garsington Opera stage. No opera is more atmospheric than Benjamin Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. In dampish Oxfordshire Wormsley estate the planets were aligned, all set fair,...
Fifty years ago, Christopher Hogwood grafted a new shoot to the tree of British classical music. His brainchild, the Academy of Ancient Music, was to champion the performance of Baroque music on contemporary instruments, providing listeners with a better understanding...
As BA cabin arrival announcements go, on landing at Larnaca in Cyprus, this was a doozy. “For those of you who have turned on your mobile phones and hit the ‘Maps’ button, we are not in Beirut”. Of course, I immediately disabled flight mode and fingered my iPhone...
All out Handel cyber-attack in Halle, Germany. Hang on! Cyber? Baroque, surely, at this 8th-century city’s annual Handelfest. You know, the towering headdresses, spangled costumes, descending Gods in fiery chariots, courtly dances, lots of standing about singing at...
Baroque opera, based as it usually is on improbable ancient myths and legends, nearly always benefits from a fresh eye from a bold director. If today’s audiences are to understand what the hell is going on, a quirky take will grab attention. Louisa Proske, Resident...
I had to respond to Reaction’s imperious demand; the motto is “Nessun Dorma” (no one sleeps). Berlin, Sunday, 12 May 15:00 CET: Unter den Linden. Event? Opera Meets New Media, an exhibition in the stunning Bertelsmann building illustrating...
In Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, Enrico Ashton gaslights his sister, Lucia, into believing her lover, Edgardo, penniless and a sworn political enemy, has abandoned her. Successfully gaslit, Enrico manipulates Lucia into marrying the rich...
The Rest is Opera:
Making opera fun for those of us who ain’t aficianados!
Neal Goren’s small opera company always has something original to say. Last year it was the premiere of a Nadia Boulanger opera, La Ville Morte, in Athens and New York! Ambitious, moi? The master saw both of them! In June look out for San Giovanni Battista by the...
An exciting, newly minted, Ring Cycle from the ever-ambitious Regents Opera. The small opera company that could. Two complete Ring Cycles from February 9th – March 2nd. Carefully crafted orchestration will ring out in York Hall, Bethnal Green. Normally the province of...
Otto Schenk, who has died aged 94, was an Austrian actor and theatre director from another era. Lavishly traditional, he was known for his attention to detailed staging notes on the score. Where Wagner wrote ‘here be dragons’ dragons is what Schenk delivered, notably...
The Master is in mourning. His outing to the Glimmerglass opera festival in upstate New York in August has been scrubbed. One of his favourite calendar items, the festival is a showcase for up and coming artists and cutting-edge productions. He was particularly...
“Perhaps by some miraculous situation we can return in the Fall.” What? Not an optimistic assessment from Peter Gelb, General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera. At the Met’s online streaming Gala, as recently as 25th April, Gelb was upbeat about “meeting in...
Sir Peter Jonas, Director of English National Opera from 1985 – 1993 and Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich 1993 – 2006 has died. He was wild on and off stage. His productions of Wagner rendered traditionalists incandescent. He kept a “stink box” of poison pen letters from...
Sir Peter Jonas, Director of English National Opera from 1985 – 1993 and Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich 1993 – 2006 has died. He was wild on and off stage. His productions of Wagner rendered traditionalists incandescent. He kept a “stink box” of poison pen letters from...
Now 41 admin staff have been placed on furlough and may be paid off, the chorus and orchestra are in deep freeze and booked artists are champing at the bit. The Met’s already dodgy finances are now in tatters. Will the hocked Chagalls in the Met lobby be called in?...