L Barbier News

Operatic comedy at its most appealing opens the 2009/10 L.A. Opera season. A magic love potion and destiny decide the fate of a love triangle involving a small-town bumpkin, a dashing sergeant and the bewitching town flirt in one of opera's most popular comedies. Filled with light-hearted charm and bursting with feel-good laughs, Gaetano Donizetti's The Elixir of Love features effervescent Italian melodies and plenty of bel canto vocal fireworks.

Washington National Opera (WNO), under the leadership of General Director Plácido Domingo, opens its 54th season with Gioachino Rossini's The Barber of Seville (Il Barbiere de Siviglia) in eight performances, September 12 to 20 at the Kennedy Center Opera House. This light-hearted opera buffa, or comic opera, features an all-star cast, including American tenor Lawrence Brownlee in his WNO debut as Count Almaviva and Bolognese bass-baritone Simone Alberghini returning as Figaro.

The Pig, the Farmer, and the Artist, an operatic satire with music, book, and lyrics by 3-time Grammy-nominated composer David Chesky, will receive its world premiere at the Gene Frankel Theatre (24 Bond Street) in October.

Tickets for the fourth season of The Met: Live in HD, the Metropolitan Opera's popular, award-winning series of live transmissions in movie theaters around the world, are now on sale to the general public in the U.S. The 2009-10 season, featuring nine live opera transmissions, kicks off on Saturday, October 10 at 1:00 p.m. ET with a new production of Puccini's Tosca starring Karita Mattila.

The Metropolitan Opera will present a free outdoor Summer HD Festival featuring ten of its award winning productions from the popular The Met: Live in HD series. The HD performances will be shown on a giant screen in front of the opera house in Lincoln Center Plaza for ten consecutive nights Saturday, August 29 through Monday, September 7.

SHN will present the all-new production of the Lincoln Center Theater prize-winning musical classic of Rodgers and Hammerstein's SOUTH PACIFIC at the Golden Gate Theatre beginning Friday, September 18 through Sunday, October 25, 2009.

Verdi's grand Egyptian pageant, Aida, returns to the Met stage with soprano Violeta Urmana singing the title role for the first time with the company and mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick as Amneris, one of her most renowned interpretations.

The Metropolitan Opera will present a free outdoor Summer HD Festival featuring ten of its award winning productions from the popular The Met: Live in HD series. The HD performances will be shown on a giant screen in front of the opera house in Lincoln Center Plaza for ten consecutive nights Saturday, August 29 through Monday, September 7.

The Metropolitan Opera announced plans for its free outdoor events this summer, which will take place in the Lincoln Center Plaza and in parks throughout New York City. In a brand new initiative, the Met's Summer HD Festival will feature screenings of ten productions from the Met's Peabody and Emmy Award-winning Live in HD series in Lincoln Center Plaza on consecutive nights, beginning Saturday, August 29.

Casting has been announced for the all-new production of the Lincoln Center Theater prize-winning musical classic Rodgers and Hammerstein's SOUTH PACIFIC premiering at the Golden Gate Theatre beginning Friday, September 18 through Sunday, October 25, 2009.

THE NEW YORK NEW MUSICAL THEATRE FESTIVAL and BRYAN PUTNAM INK are pleased to announce the world premiere production of THE TOYMAKER, directed by Lawrence Edelson. THE TOYMAKER will play a limited engagement at Theatre at St. Clement's (423 West 46th Street, New York, NY 10036.) Performances begin Monday, October 5 and continue through Sunday, October 18.

The Pig, The Farmer, and The Artist: An Operatic Satire About Sex, Music, and Art, with music/book/lyrics by multi-Grammy-nominated composer David Chesky, will receive its world premiere performance at the Gene Frankel Theatre (24 Bond Street, in NYC's East Village - the setting for the opera), Friday, October 2, 7:00 p.m.

Mozart's comic masterpiece, Le Nozze di Figaro, returns to the Met repertory on September 22 with some of opera's most notable young talent, many of them in company debuts or new roles. Danielle de Niese sings Susanna at the Met for the first time, paired with the Figaro of John Relyea, who received the Beverly Sills Artist Award for young singers earlier this year.

The Metropolitan Opera has reason to celebrate; $2.5 million worth of tickets were sold on Sunday, the first day of sales, through its box office, telephone call center and Web site, up from $2 million on the first day of sales last year, according to the Associated press.

Operatic comedy at its most appealing opens the 2009/10 L.A. Opera season. A magic love potion and destiny decide the fate of a love triangle involving a small-town bumpkin, a dashing sergeant and the bewitching town flirt in one of opera's most popular comedies. Filled with light-hearted charm and bursting with feel-good laughs, Gaetano Donizetti's The Elixir of Love features effervescent Italian melodies and plenty of bel canto vocal fireworks.

The Met has announced that soprano Angela Gheorghiu has withdrawn from the first six performances of a new production of Bizet's Carmen for personal reasons. Gheorghiu will be replaced by El?na Garan?a, who sang the title role of La Cenerentola at the Met last spring to great acclaim; that production was transmitted to movie theaters worldwide as part of the Met's Live in HD series.

The Metropolitan Opera will present a free outdoor Summer HD Festival featuring ten of its award winning productions from the popular The Met: Live in HD series. The HD performances will be shown on a giant screen in front of the opera house in Lincoln Center Plaza for ten consecutive nights Saturday, August 29 through Monday, September 7.

The National Touring Company of Rodgers & Hammerstein's SOUTH PACIFIC will be led by Rod Gilfry (Emile de Becque) and Carmen Cusack (Nellie Forbush), with Anderson Davis (Lt. Cable), Matthew Saldivar (Luther Billis), Keala Settle (Bloody Mary), Gerry Becker (Capt. Brackett), Peter Rini (Cmdr. Harbison), Sumie Maeda (Liat), Rusty Ross (Professor) and original 2008 Broadway cast member Genson Blimline (Stewpot).

The Tony Award®-winning Old Globe continues its 2009 Summer Shakespeare Festival with Shakespeare's TWELFTH NIGHT, a delightful tale of wild infatuation and mistaken identities. The production debuts tonight in the Globe's outdoor Lowell Davies Festival Theatre.

Producer Jeffrey Finn announced today that OLEANNA, the provocative drama by Pulitzer Prize winner David Mamet, will have its first-ever Broadway production as part of the 2009-2010 Broadway Season. Starring Bill Pullman and Julia Stiles and directed by Tony Award winner Doug Hughes, the play is a gripping account of a power struggle between a male university professor and one of his female students.