Benjamin Britten News

The Metropolitan Opera's 2013-14 season will feature many of the world's greatest singers, conductors, and theater artists in 26 operas, including six new productions, of a varied repertory that ranges from the Baroque era to the 21st century. Met Music Director James Levine will return to the Met podium for the first time in two years, conducting three operas with which he has long been associated: a new production of Verdi's final masterpiece Falstaff, Mozart's Cosi fan tutte, and Berg's Wozzeck. Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi will be conducting two operas in the 2013-14 season, Rossini's La Cenerentola and Puccini's Madama Butterfly.

The Metropolitan Opera's 2013-14 season will feature many of the world's greatest singers, conductors, and theater artists in 26 operas, including six new productions, of a varied repertory that ranges from the Baroque era to the 21st century. Met Music Director James Levine will return to the Met podium for the first time in two years, conducting three operas with which he has long been associated: a new production of Verdi's final masterpiece Falstaff, Mozart's Cosi fan tutte, and Berg's Wozzeck. Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi will be conducting two operas in the 2013-14 season, Rossini's La Cenerentola and Puccini's Madama Butterfly.

Conductor James Conlon will continue his three-year celebration of the music of composer Benjamin Britten throughout the remainder of the 2012-13 season and during the 2013-14 season with performances encompassing opera, orchestra and choral works including spearheading LA Opera's year-long, city-wide Britten 100/LA: A Celebration festival and returning to The Metropolitan Opera in October 2013 to conduct A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Houston Chamber Choir presents What Sweeter Music with special guest, noted English conductor Simon Carrington, Saturday, March 2, 7:30pm at The Church of St. John the Divine (2450 River Oaks Blvd., Houston, TX) and Sunday, March 3 at 4:00 pm at the Imperial Arts, Center for the Arts (823 3rd Street, Rosenberg, TX). What Sweeter Music spans five centuries of British a cappella repertoire, from Lamentations of Jeremiah by Elizabethan composer Robert White, to Pete Townshend's Pinball Wizard from The Who's 1969 rock opera Tommy. Additional works include Bob Chilcott's (fellow former member of The King's Singers) Weather Report, and Benjamin Britten's settings of seven poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins, A.M.D.G (Ad majorem Dei gloriam).

Placido Domingo, LA Opera's Eli and Edythe Broad General Director, announced today that James Conlon, the Company's Richard Seaver Music Director, has extended his contract with LA Opera through the end of the 2017/2018 season. "James has had an incredible impact on the artistic quality of LA Opera performances," said Mr. Domingo. "Since his arrival, he has conducted more than half of our mainstage performances, inspiring performers and audiences alike through his extraordinary talents. His vision for the company's future, like mine, is one of great ambition and optimism. We have so many exciting plans for LA Opera's seasons to come, and I am greatly looking forward to continuing our work together."

Philadelphia Orchestra Music Director Yannick Nezet-Seguin and President and CEO Allison Vulgamore today announce the 2013-14 season of The Philadelphia Orchestra.

The Opera Institute at Boston University will present 'Owen Wingrave' with Nickoli Strommer starring in the title role. The production opens on February 21 through February 24. Click below for rehersal photos!

The Church of the Transfiguration ('The Little Church Around the Corner') presents Curlew River in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Britten. This will be a fully staged and costumed production of Britten's chamber opera about a Madwoman searching for her son, who was kidnapped and brutally murdered, as performed by Medieval monks.

The University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra (UMSO) brings Benjamin Britten's Les Illuminations, Op. 18 to life on March 9 at 8pm in the Clarice Smith Center's Dekelboum Concert Hall.

Music Director Thierry Fischer, Principal Pops Conductor Jerry Steichen and Associate Conductor Vladimir Kulenovic today announced the Utah Symphony's complete 2013-2014 season, in which Fischer will again conduct 12 of the 18 Masterworks performances.

On Tuesday, February 26, the debut recording of David T. Little's 'sharp, elegantly bristling' opera-theatre piece, Soldier Songs (2006), which recently completed a wildly successful NYC premiere run on the inaugural PROTOTYPE festival, is released on audio CD from Innova Recordings, produced by Lawson White. The recording receives its digital release on iTunes and Amazon today, February 5, 2013.

New York City Opera concludes its spring 2013 BAM residency and celebrates the centennial of composer Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) with a brand-new production of Britten's chamber opera The Turn of the Screw (1954). Based on the classic ghost story by Henry James, the opera's libretto is by Myfanwy Piper. The production, conducted by Jayce Ogren, marks the opera debut of Sam Buntrock, the theater director best known for his award-winning staging of Sunday in the Park with George in the West End and on Broadway.

Clive Gillinson, Executive and Artistic Director, today announced Carnegie Hall's 2013-2014 season, consisting of over 170 performances and extensive education and community programs created by Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute. The upcoming season features collaborations with many of the world's greatest musicians and ensembles from the worlds of classical, pop, jazz, and world music, with performances presented on Carnegie Hall's three stages and throughout New York City.

Earlier today, TSO Music Director Peter Oundjian announced the 2013/2014 season of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra (TSO), this will be the orchestra's 92nd season. This upcoming season, on-stage at Roy Thomson Hall between September 2013 and June 2014, marks Music Director Peter Oundjian's 10th season.

Houston Chamber Choir presents What Sweeter Music with special guest, noted English conductor Simon Carrington, Saturday, March 2, 7:30pm at The Church of St. John the Divine (2450 River Oaks Blvd., Houston, TX) and Sunday, March 3 at 4:00 pm at the Imperial Arts, Center for the Arts (823 3rd Street, Rosenberg, TX). The Chamber Choir and Simon Carrington offer a sampling of British a cappella music that includes works by Benjamin Britten, Bob Chilcott, James MacMillan and Pete Townshend of The Who.

Juilliard's FOCUS! 2013: The British Renaissance festival has announced its lineup, running tonight, January 25 through February 1, 2013.

Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts today announces additional local, national and international performers, adding to the 35 partners listed below already announced in September 2013, as part of the program line-up for Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts (PIFA) 2013, March 28 to April 27, sponsored by TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank. With more than 50 festival performances and events taking place throughout Philadelphia, 50 regional arts and cultural partners, and 32 new works, PIFA 2013's If You Had a Time Machine….now includes the star talents of tap dance sensation and choreographer Savion Glover, jazz pianist and record producer Robert Glasper and Special Guests, Panamanian global jazz artist Danilo Pérez and Panama 500 Band, Instrumentalist and composer DJ Dan Deacon, Choir of King's College Cambridge, and more. Tickets go on sale to the public for all PIFA 2013 performances and events beginning Wednesday, January 23 at 10 a.m.

The Canadian Opera Company unveiled its 2013/2014 season today at a press conference at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. The company's 64th season stars the world's best singers, conductors, directors and designers in a performance year with seven operas, including three COC premieres and three new COC productions. The COC presents Giacomo Puccini's La Bohème with a new production featuring some of Canada's brightest stars; COC Music Director Johannes Debus makes his Benjamin Britten debut when he conducts Peter Grimes with a production starring acclaimed Canadian tenor Ben Heppner in the iconic title role; Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Così fan tutte with a new COC production by renowned film and theatre director Atom Egoyan with Debus conducting; Giuseppe Verdi's Un ballo in maschera starring great Canadian diva Adrianne Pieczonka in a role debut; George Frideric Handel's Hercules with a COC premiere and new COC production by world-renowned director Peter Sellars with a star-studded cast; Gaetano Donizetti's Roberto Devereux with a COC premiere starring soprano Sondra Radvanovsky in a role debut; and Jules Massenet's Don Quichotte with a COC premiere featuring Debus in another conducting debut and the world's pre-eminent bass Ferruccio Furlanetto in the title role.

Lindsay Posner directs Rebecca Lenkiewicz' new stage adaptation of Henry James' The Turn of the Screw at the Almeida Theatre which runs until 16 March 2013, with press night on 24 January. The cast comprises Caroline Bartleet (a woman), Laurence Belcher (Miles), Eoin Geoghegan (a man), Gemma Jones (Mrs. Grose), Anna Madeley (The Governess), Orlando Wells (Sackville) and Isabella Blake, Emilia Jones and Lucy Morton who will alternate the role of Flora. The Turn of the Screw is sponsored by Pinsent Masons LLP.

The 65th annual Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, under the leadership of General Manager Bernard Foccroulle, will feature five opera productions, a selection of orchestral concerts, recitals, chamber music performances, world music programs, and more than 50 events from the 16th annual European Academy of Music. The Festival marks important milestones this year: Giuseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner's 200th birthday anniversaries; Benjamin Britten's centennial; the 50th anniversary of Francis Poulenc's death; and celebrates Marseille-Provence 2013, European Cultural Capital for the year. All events unfold in extraordinary venues, many of them open-air, in and around the picturesque ancient Provencal city: a Medieval archbishop's palace, an 18th century Italian-style theatre, a private courtyard hidden behind doors dating back to the time of Louis XV, and an 11th century Romanesque chapel inside the grounds of a Renaissance castle - as well as a state of the art, 1,350-seat theatre. The official portion of the Festival runs from July 4 to 27, 2013.