Feature: Virtual Opera Streaming 21-28 at Home Computer Screens

On Wednesday, April 21, We meet at the Magic Opera Flying Carpet in LAX to begin this week's tour with one of the Los Angeles Opera website's most popular "Living Room Recitals." Soprano, Latonia Moore sings with pianist Roberto Berrocal. Her program includes

"Tatiana's Letter Scene" from Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin,

Three selections from Six Songs, op. 38 by Rachmaninoff, "In My Garden at Night," "To Her," and "A-oo,"

"D'ogni dolor... nel villaggio d'Edgar" from Puccini's Edgar,

Granada by Agustín Lara, and for a finale, "Stresa" from Vignettes of Italy and "Joy" by Wintter Watts.

LINK: https://www.laopera.org/discover/la-opera-on-now/la-opera-on-now-all-events/living-room-recital-latonia-moore/

After the recital we enjoy some local craft beer and sing some German and English drinking songs until it's time to depart for the New Jersey Airport that we use as our portal to New York City. When the humans have what they need for the night handy, and the cats, Manon-la-Chat, Mamma Lucia, and Baby Turiddu, are settled in, we take off into the dark sky. Even LAX is quiet at midnight when all the commercial flights have landed.

We arrive in New Jersey around 7 AM. on Thursday, and will bus tour members, still in night clothes, to Shut Up and Eat, the Toms River restaurant that offers a discount to patrons who arrive in pajamas.

Later, we bus to the Frick Collection which contains art from the Renaissance to the early twentieth century. Founded by Henry Clay Frick (1849-1919), this museum offers visitors a chance to see one of the world's foremost collections of European fine and decorative arts. Paintings include celebrated works by Rembrandt, Fragonard, Ingres, Bellini, and Vermeer.

LINK: https://artsandculture.google.com/partner/the-frick-collection

LINK: https://www.timeout.com/newyork/news/take-a-trip-to-your-favorite-nyc-museums-with-these-virtual-tours-031720

For dinner in a restaurant near the Metropolitan Opera we order Maine Lobster Risotto made with saffron infused Carnaroli rice. Manon and Mamma Lucia are eating NYC's best canned cat food!

On Thursday, April 22, Verdi's Simon Boccanegra stars Anna Tomowa-Sintow, Vasile Moldoveanu, Sherrill Milnes, and Paul Plishka. The 1984 Tito Capobianco production is conducted by James Levine.

LINK: https://metoperafree.brightcove-services.com/?videoId=6245234876001

Some tour members stay at the Empire Hotel across the street from Lincoln Center, but more economically conscious folks return to their recliner-beds on the Magic Opera Flying Carpet with me. We have a few more drinking songs to sing, rewarded by beer and seven layer cake before retiring.

We sleep late the morning after Boccanegra and enjoy a Mexican brunch buffet on the Flying Carpet. In the afternoon we bus into town to see the Dior Ball Gown exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. According to the museum, Christian Dior established his Maison de la Couture in 1947 with a collection that stunned the world with its imaginative but extravagant use of fabric. After the deprivations of World War II, the designer believed that the survival of the haute couture relied on its ability to restore fantasy and luxury to women's wardrobes.

LINK: https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/christian-dior-the-new-look/cQKikHJ-Ok8UIg?hl=en

For dinner at a Columbus Circle area delicatessen, we order pastrami on rye, pickles, sauerkraut, and lots of coffee. On Friday, April 23, The Met offers Philip Glass's Satyagraha staring Rachelle Durkin, Richard Croft, Kim Josephson, and Alfred Walker. The 2011 Phelim McDermott production is conducted by Dante Anzolini.

LINK: https://metoperafree.brightcove-services.com/?videoId=6245234876001

After a glass of an adult beverage on the Flying Carpet, we take off for San Francisco. We park the Flying Carpet in Novato, CA and bus to the city where we stop at the Buena Vista Cafe for Irish coffee.

Although Irish coffee was born on the Emerald Isle, it was first popularized in San Francisco. The city's Buena Vista Cafe co-owner Jack Koeppler challenged international travel writer Stanton Delaplane to help him re-create the liquor-infused coffee served at an Irish airport. They crafted the perfect combination of hot coffee, Irish whiskey and whipped cream that we love today.

After a pleasant Mexican dinner on the Flying Carpet, some tour members bus to San Rafael for a live drive-in performance of Rossini's The Barber of Seville sung in English with English supertitles. It's performed at the Marin Center, San Rafael, California, 15 minutes north of the Golden Gate Bridge. We have folding chairs so we can sit outside the bus. San Francisco invites us to witness a zany new take on Rossini's beloved classic opera in a 90-minute adaptation by director Matthew Ozawa featuring a stellar cast including Lucas Meachem, Daniela Mack, and Alek Shrader.

After the performance, we bus back to the Flying Opera Magic Carpet to get ready for a night over the high seas-next stop Rome for refueling and brunch of spaghetti carbonara which is pasta with prosciutto ham, eggs, and cheese.

We are actually flying to Reggio Emilia, some 200 miles north of Rome. The cuisine of Emilia-Romagna is well known for its Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, balsamic vinegar, prosciutto and pasta dishes such as tortellini stuffed with meat or cheese. For dinner at a restaurant in town we order cheese tortellini topped with meat sauce and salad dressed with local olive oil and vinegar. Neither Manon nor Mamma Lucia is happy with our meal choices. They are eating Italian cat food and I am trying to keep the Flying Carpet from smelling fishy.

A very different staging of Gioachino Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia was recorded in Italian, live at the Teatro Municipale Valli in Reggio Emilia. YouTube subtitles are in English. The cast includes César Cortés as Count of Almaviva, Pablo Ruiz as Don Bartolo, Michela Antenucci as Rosina, Simone del Savio as Figaro, and Guido Loconsolo as Don Basilio. Fabio Cherstich directs and the Filarmonica dell'Opera Italiana Reggio Emilia is conducted by Bruno Baronetto.

LINK. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWMBUX1KgCw

After the opera, we fly to Maastricht, Holland where we park in an open field near the river Meuse. For the next afternoon, we book a cruise down the Meuse. Within an hour, we see the entire city and its skyline from the water. Just before reaching the Belgian border, the boat turns around and brings us back into the Netherlands. Since passengers can sit inside, a fine drizzle does not bother us as we embark on the tour.

After the tour we rejoin our bus for the trip to the Château Neercanne, located just north of the Belgian village of Kanne. It is built on a site used by the Romans. The present main building was built in 1698 by the military governor of Maastricht, Daniël Wolf van Dopff. In the valley in front of the castle, there is a riverside baroque garden where tour members may walk before dinner if they so desire.

Château Neercanne's Marl caves, created by mining blocks of the stone to build the fortifications, are now in use as the restaurant's wine cellar and banquet rooms. Our group of 70 is dining in one of the caves this evening.

Opera Zuid of Maastricht, presents La voix Humaine by Francis Poulenc and L'Heure Espagnole by Maurice Ravel. In the first opera, a woman calls her ex-lover on the telephone, unable to let go of him. She flatters, despairs and blackmails him in the hope that he will not hang up on her. In the second, The clockmaker's wife takes advantage of her husband's absence to receive her lovers.

In Opera Zuid's double bill of these 20th century French masterpieces, everything revolves around the female protagonists and their emotional development. The one-act operas La Voix humaine and L'Heure Espagnole, each lasting less than an hour, present themselves as two sides of the same coin united by the same longing for connection to another human being. Opera Zuid's performance, recorded in 2020, is sung in French, but subtitles are in English.The stream is available until June, 2021.

LINK: https://operavision.eu/en/library/spectacles/operas/la-voix-humaine-lheure-espagnole-opera-zuid

For the Flying Carpet, its a short hop to Aix en Provence in France.

Before the opera, we dine at a bistro located in the city square. The restaurant's red, yellow, and orange decor creates a warm, comforting atmosphere in which to serve their classic cuisine with cosmopolitan influences. We order a five-course menu consisting of an appetizer terrine, poached freshly caught fish, steak medallions, assorted cheeses, and a choice of layer cake or fruit tart.

In Aix, Jérémie Rhorer conducts the Cercle de l'Harmonie in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Don Giovanni. The staging is by Jean-François Sivadier, with Philippe Sly as Don Giovanni. Nahuel di Pierro is Leporello, Eleonora Buratto is Donna Anna, Pavol Breslik is Don Ottavio, Isabel Leonard is Donna Elvira, Julie Fuchs is Zerlina, Krzysztof Baczyk is Masetto and David Leigh is the Commendatore. The opera was recorded live at the Festival International d'Art Lyrique d'Aix-en-Provence in 2017.

LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hnd5ULYG2no

This time we saved some of the fresh fish for our feline friends who dined back at the Flying Carpet. We also ordered more cheeses and fruit tarts to eat as a midnight supper before leaving for California.

The photo of Maestro Roderick Cox conducting a rehearsal of The Barber of Seville in San Francisco is by Stefan Cohen, courtesy of San Francisco Opera.

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