MUSETTA

In an opera filled with gorgeous music, it’s hard to beat the end of LA BOHEME’s Act One, with the trifecta of arias about young love. If only tragedy and sadness weren’t going to catch up with the central pair, Mimi and Rodolfo, and their friends, in the succeeding three “tales from the Bohemian life” (as the work’s source material was called). But wait. Director Yuval Sharon to the rescue, with a version that just finished a successful run at Opera Philadelphia, playing out the story in revers...

​​​​​​​Ivo van Hove, the Tony Award–winning director of Broadway's A View from the Bridge, makes a major Met debut with Mozart's Don Giovanni (May 5–June 2), re-setting the familiar tale of deceit and damnation in an abstract architectural landscape and shining a light into the work's dark corners....

The Met presents the winners of the 2023 Metropolitan Opera Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition: tenor Anthony León, mezzo-soprano Natalie Lewis, soprano Teresa Perrotta, mezzo-soprano Sarah Saturnino, bass-baritone Christian Simmons, and soprano Meredith Wohlgemuth. ...

Tenor Yusif Eyvazov, who was scheduled to sing Rodolfo in the upcoming four performances of Puccini's La Bohème, is ill and has withdrawn. He is being replaced by Matthew Polenzani, who will sing the performances on May 16 and 24; Stephen Costello, who will sing on May 20; and Russell Thomas, who will sing on May 27....

After a season-long series of competitions at the district, regional, and national levels, a panel of expert judges named six singers as the winners of the 2022 Metropolitan Opera Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition. ...

Puccini's 'La Boheme,' returned for its second run of the season this week and cast and conductor delivered the goods. There's nothing to say that has not already been said about La Boheme as an opera and the famous Zeffirelli production, so we won't dwell on it....

Every time I head to a performance of Puccini’s LA BOHEME, I can’t help but think of Bette Davis’s famous line from “All About Eve”: “I detest cheap sentiment.” But then I actually get there and, more likely than not, I feel genuinely moved, swept away by the mood that the composer and his librettists (Illica and Giacosa) have conceived through what seems like an endless array of gorgeous melodies in the Franco Zeffirelli production. ...

Puccini’s opera of passion, friendship and heartbreak is one of the best-loved operas worldwide. Richard Jones’s recent production for The Royal Opera, adapted to accommodate safety regulations, perfectly captures the vulnerability of youth amid the harshness and glamour of a big city. ...

The High Note returns this week, June 26 at noon, with a new episode and updates from Opera Orlando. Executive director and Grammy award winning baritone Gabriel Preisser hosts the live-streamed series by Opera Orlando, presented on the Company's Facebook page....

Amanda Woodbury will sing the Countess in all upcoming performances of Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro, replacing Anita Hartig, who is ill....

Park Avenue Armory will embark on the eighth year of its Recital Series, a series of intimate chamber music performances in the austerely elegant Board of Officers, intended to continue the salon tradition of chamber music performances. The 2020 Recital Series will open with two performances by young Italian soprano Rosa Feola, Monday evening, January 13, 2020 and Wednesday evening, January 15, 2020, both at 7:30pm....