Alicia Gianni News

This is the last chance to vote for the 2021 BroadwayWorld Houston Awards! The 2021 Regional Awards honor productions which had their first performance between October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2021.

Time is running out to vote for for the 2021 BroadwayWorld Houston Awards! The 2021 Regional Awards honor productions which had their first performance between October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2021.

Beginning on June 14, youth aged 12-19 are invited to attend Houston Grand Opera's virtual summer camp, Discover Opera. As part of the camp, participants will collaborate to produce one-minute operatic videos inspired by the viral videos of TikTok star Daniel Mertzlufft.

Houston Grand Opera (HGO) returns this Friday, Oct. 23 on HGO Digital with the release of Vinkensport, or The Finch Opera, a hilarious sendup of the little-known Belgian sport of professional finch-calling by composer David T. Little and librettist Royce Vavrek.

Houston Grand Opera (HGO) marks the sixth decade of making the art of opera accessible to all audiences at Miller Outdoor Theatre with two free, fully staged performances of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love on May 19 and 20, starting at 8 p.m. A magic elixir gives a love-struck young man the extra dose of confidence he needs to thwart a rival and win the woman of his dreams, but the elixir creates just as many problems as it solves. The bright, sunny production is set on the Amalfi Coast in the 1950s-complete with Vespas and a hot air balloon. With beautiful melodies and a hilarious story, it's the perfect entry point to the world of opera for the young and the young-at-heart.   

Houston Grand Opera expands its commitment to broadening the audience for opera with a 2017-18 season that includes the first presentations of Leonard Bernstein's classic musical West Side Story by a major American opera house and the world premiere of composer Ricky Ian Gordon and librettist Royce Vavrek's holiday opera The House without a Christmas Tree. HGO will present its first performances in a quarter century of two iconic works: Richard Strauss's revenge-filled Elektra with virtuoso sopranoChristine Goerke in the tempestuous title role and 2016 Richard Tucker Award-winner and HGO Studio alumna Tamara Wilson in her role debut as Chrysothemis, under the baton of HGO Artistic and Music Director Patrick Summers; and Bellini's grand-scale tragedy Norma showcasing the debut of stellar dramatic soprano Liudmyla Monastyrska in the notoriously difficult title role, with 2015 Tucker winner and HGO Studio alumna Jamie Barton as Adalgisa.

BWW Review: Houston Grand Opera opens the season with an eye-popping ELIXIR OF LOVE

I am taken back to the first Opera I saw as a kid and the pomp and circumstance with wearing a tux and walking to the lavish theatre; this was when I fell in love with classical music. Often times we hear opera and other classical art forms are inaccessible to the people, but Houston Grand Opera's English translation of Mozart's THE MAGIC FLUTE (Die Zauberflote) proved that opera isn't a stuffy, highbrow art form for the bourgeois. THE MAGIC FLUTE premiered on September 30, 1791 at Emanuel Schikaneder's theatre, the Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden in Vienna, and Mozart conducted the orchestra. The MAGIC FLUTE often referenced as a singspiel, is an opus with spoken dialogue which lends itself to the elements of classical musical theatre. The heart of this new work was an excerpt from the oriental genie tales collected by poet Christoph Martin Wieland but transitioned to have Masonic elements from the novel Sethos by Abbe Jean Terrasson.

The 280+ arts patrons who gathered May 30 at the Petroleum Club of Houston for Opera in the Heights' Bravissimo! 2014: 'The Grand Gala' got a delightful surprise during the seated dinner: Stirring performances by rising opera singers and musical theater talents Alicia Gianni and Chris Newcomer. Scroll down for photos from the event!

Ever since it premiered on Broadway in 1973, Stephen Sondheim's A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC, with a book by Hugh Wheeler, has been a favorite of musical theatre fans. The Michigan Opera Theatre was the first American opera company to present the piece in 1983, and other companies followed suit. It last graced Houston Grand Opera's (HGO) stages in 1999. Now, the musical, with an extraordinary set and gorgeous costumes by Isaac Mizrahi, is thrilling Houston audiences again with HGO's latest production of this American masterpiece.

The new year has already brought notable success for Houston Grand Opera (HGO), where the hotly anticipated American premiere of the long-lost Holocaust opera The Passenger-hailed by the Associated Press as 'the latest coup for a company known for producing new works'-took the national and local press by storm, and where the company's Rigoletto revival was pronounced 'glorious' (Theater Jones). These accolades come at an exciting time for the company, which continues this season's extraordinary line-up with the launch of the first American presentation of a visionary and groundbreaking treatment of Das Rheingold by La Fura dels Baus; the world premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon's A Coffin in Egypt, named one of the twelve 'must-see opera events of the season' (Opera News); a new HGO production of Carmen from Broadway sensation Rob Ashford; and Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music, which boasts designs by fashion icon Isaac Mizrahi.

The new year has already brought notable success for Houston Grand Opera (HGO), where the hotly anticipated American premiere of the long-lost Holocaust opera The Passenger-hailed by the Associated Press as 'the latest coup for a company known for producing new works'-took the national and local press by storm, and where the company's Rigoletto revival was pronounced 'glorious' (Theater Jones). These accolades come at an exciting time for the company, which continues this season's extraordinary line-up with the launch of the first American presentation of a visionary and groundbreaking treatment of Das Rheingold by La Fura dels Baus; the world premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon's A Coffin in Egypt, named one of the twelve 'must-see opera events of the season' (Opera News); a new HGO production of Carmen from Broadway sensation Rob Ashford; and Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music, which boasts designs by fashion icon Isaac Mizrahi.