Ginger Costa-Jackson News

Opera Saratoga's Artistic and General Director Lawrence Edelson announced today the three exciting new productions that will comprise the company's 2017 Summer Festival, which will build on the company's commitment to producing masterpieces from the operatic cannon, important American works, and works in which dance plays an integral role.

For a director known as opera's bad boy, Calixto Bieito turned to something awfully familiar in CARMEN for his US debut. Then again, he didn't actually show up for it, tied up with a new production of Aribert Reimann's LEAR in Paris and dispatching one of his top collabortors, Joan Anton Rechi, to pull it together.

The San Francisco Opera held its final dress rehearsal for Carmen on Wednesday afternoon, which is set to open this weekend.  During the rehearsal, they allowed live tweeting with the hashtag #CarmenSF.

San Francisco Opera's Summer 2016 Season at the War Memorial Opera House opens May 27 with Georges Bizet's Carmen. Opera's ultimate femme fatale returns in a bold staging by the daring Catalan opera and theater director Calixto Bieito in his U.S. opera debut. Mezzo-sopranos Irene Roberts and Ginger Costa-Jackson star in the passionate title role. In a casting change announced today, tenor Brian Jagde, originally scheduled to star as Don Jose in six of Carmen's eleven performances running through July 3, will now sing the role for all performances except May 28, which will be sung by Adam Diegel. Jagde and Diegel replace tenor Maxim Aksenov, who has withdrawn from the production for personal reasons. San Francisco Opera also returns to AT&T Park, home of the San Francisco Giants, for a free live simulcast of Carmen on July 2.

Continuing a tradition inaugurated in 2006, the Met offers a holiday presentation sung in English with special discount pricing for families this December and January. This year's production, Rossini's madcap comedy The Barber of Seville, opens December 16 and stars Isabel Leonard and Ginger Costa-Jackson as Rosina; David Portillo and Taylor Stayton as Count Almaviva; Elliot Madore and David Pershall as Figaro; Valeriano Lanchas as Dr. Bartolo; and Robert Pomakov as Don Basilio. Antony Walker conducts all nine performances of the opera, which runs through January 2.

The new opera season doesn't start till September at the earliest. What's an opera fan to do until the Met's curtain goes up on September 21? Well, with a little bit of effort, opera in New York and the surrounding states during the summer months can offer quite a bit.

It was 'out with the old, in with the new' for another of the Franco Zeffirelli productions that were once the Metropolitan Opera's bread and butter, designed for audiences to cheer for the scenery even when the cast might not have been top drawer. This time, the victims of changing times (and administrations) were the twin bill of Mascagni's CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA and Leoncavallo's PAGLIACCI.

In a record-breaking year for the number of prizes and total cash awarded, Lauren Michelle, of Los Angeles, won the $15,000 First Prize in the finals of the 2015 Lotte Lenya Competition, sponsored by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music and held on April 18, 2015, in Kilbourn Hall of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. Robin Bailey, of London, U.K., and Jordan Davidson, of Philadelphia, N.Y., both won Second Prizes of $10,000, and two Third Prizes of $7,500 each were awarded to Adam Fieldson, of Lincoln, Neb., and Michael Maliakel, of New York.

The 2015 Metropolitan Summer Recital Series will once again bring free outdoor recitals starring leading Met artists, as well as rising young stars of the opera world, to New Yorkers in all five boroughs.

Fourteen exceptionally talented singer-actors from the United States, United Kingdom, and Germany have been selected as finalists in the 2015 Lotte Lenya Competition, held annually by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music. They will compete for top prizes of $15,000, $10,000 and $7,500 on Saturday, April 18, 2015, in Rochester, New York.

San Francisco Opera General Director David Gockley and Music Director Nicola Luisotti today announced the Company's 2015-16 season repertory and roster of international and critically acclaimed guest artists, conductors and creative teams scheduled to appear at the War Memorial Opera House.

Gotham Chamber Opera announces the revival of the 2010 production El gato con botas (Puss in Boots) from December 6-14, 2014 at El Teatro at El Museo del Barrio, 1230 Fifth Avenue at 104th Street, NYC. Tickets are $30-$175 (discounts available for children) and are available online at www.ticketcentral.com, by phone at (212) 279-4200, or by visiting the Ticket Central box office at 416 W. 42nd Street (between 9th and 10th Avenues) in the lobby of Playwrights Horizons. For more information, visit www.gothamchamberopera.org.

Gotham Chamber Opera, in collaboration with the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, presents a double bill of Alexandre bis & Comedy on the Bridge, both by Bohuslav Martinu, from today, October 14 - 18, 2014 at Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, 524 West 59th Street.

Gotham Chamber Opera, in collaboration with the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, presents a double bill of Alexandre bis & Comedy on the Bridge, both by Bohuslav Martinu, from October 14 - 18, 2014 at Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, 524 West 59th Street.

Five years ago, box office records were shattered when Carmen became the fastest-selling production in Vancouver Opera history. Vancouverites will be seduced again when the fiery gypsy returns to the Queen Elizabeth Theatre stage this September/October. The passion, the colour, the sensuality and, of course, the unforgettable music of the world's sexiest opera will come alive for 6 performances only.

Five years ago, box office records were shattered when Carmen became the fastest-selling production in Vancouver Opera history. Vancouverites will be seduced again when the fiery gypsy returns to the Queen Elizabeth Theatre stage this September/October. The passion, the colour, the sensuality and, of course, the unforgettable music of the world's sexiest opera will come alive for 6 performances only.

Gotham Chamber Opera announces the 2014/2015 season, which begins with Alexandre bis/Comedy on the Bridge, both by Bohuslav Martinu, from October 14 - 18, 2014, followed by the revival of Gotham's 2010 production El gato con botas (Puss in Boots) in December at El Museo del Barrio.

Ben Edquist, of Houston, won the $15,000 First Prize in the finals of the 2014 Lotte Lenya Competition, sponsored by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music and held on April 12, 2014, in Kilbourn Hall of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. Arlo Hill, of New York, won the Second Prize of $10,000, and the Third Prize of $7,500 was awarded to Natalie Ballenger, also of New York.

The Metropolitan Opera's two popular series of free summer events, the Summer Recital Series and the Summer HD Festival, will return in 2014. For the sixth consecutive year, the Met will present operatic recitals in parks in all five boroughs, as well as a ten-day outdoor festival at Lincoln Center featuring encore screenings from the Met's popular Live in HD transmissions.