Let's Hear It for the Five Winners of the Met's 2025 Laffont Competition!
by Richard Sasanow - Mar 18, 2025
Imagine being a rising young opera singer and getting to sing two solos from the stage of the Metropolitan Opera. And picture receiving $20,000 and the prestige, exposure and networking opportunities that come with it. That's what came to Sopranos Alissa Goretsky and Emma Marhefka, Mezzos Sadie Cheslak and Michelle Mariposa, and Baritone Luke Sutliff, who took top honors and applause from the crowd of thousands at the opera house on Sunday March 16.
Review: IL TROVATORE, Royal Ballet And Opera
by Michael Higgs - Feb 27, 2025
An animated revival of Adele Thomas’s 2023 production, Il Trovatore strays from realism and instead focuses on a symbolic reading of this dark and gritty opera. With macabre medieval costumes, eery effects and a brilliant cast, it’s an unnerving experience.
Xian Zhang Conducts New Jersey Symphony's 2025 Lunar New Year Celebration
by A.A. Cristi - Dec 12, 2024
New Jersey Symphony will present a special performance for the 2025 Lunar New Year Celebration ringing in the Year of the Snake. Music Director Xian Zhang will conduct the performance on Saturday, January 25, 2025, at 7:30 pm at New Jersey Performing Arts Center.
Review: Top Singing and Tap Dancing Highlight Richard Tucker Awards Gala
by Richard Sasanow - Nov 3, 2024
As usual, the gala concert of the Richard Tucker Music Foundation started off with an interloper from the golden age of opera: Richard Tucker himself, singing Mascagni’s “Addio alla Madre” from CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA. A tough act to follow for those singing live at Carnegie Hall, but happily no one seemed daunted by it. That doesn’t mean everything went smoothly at the gala concert, which is par for the course of the annual event. Despite the prestige of the Richard Tucker Awards, the world doesn’t stop when the Tucker Foundation comes a calling.
Review: The Marx Brothers Found Life in TROVATORE that the Met Couldn’t Muster
by Richard Sasanow - Nov 1, 2024
I must admit that the Met’s current revival of IL TROVATORE--with RIGOLETTO and TRAVIATA, considered the great creations of Verdi’s middle period--made me think of another masterwork, “A Night at the Opera,” my favorite of the movies by those champions of silliness, the Marx Brothers.
More Artists Join Lineup for Richard Tucker Music Foundation 2024 Opera Gala at Carnegie Hall
by Stephi Wild - Oct 10, 2024
The Richard Tucker Music Foundation presents its annual Gala on Sunday, October 27, 2024 at 6:30 p.m. at Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall, and countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo, tenor Anthony Léon, soprano Nadine Sierra, and soprano Elena Villalón join the star-studded line-up of previous Richard Tucker Award Winners, Grant Recipients, and special guests.
San Francisco Opera Opens 102nd Season With Opera in the Park
by Stephi Wild - Sep 6, 2024
San Francisco Opera will celebrate the opening of its 102nd season with San Francisco Chronicle Presents Opera in the Park on Sunday, September 8 at 1:30 p.m. The free concert—a beloved annual Bay Area tradition now in its 49th year—takes place at Robin Williams Meadow in Golden Gate Park.