Opera Australia has announced details of its 2015 season, consolidating the recent success in building audiences, with a program that is uniquely audience-focused. Clear in its aim to grow audiences even further with masterpieces of opera and music theatre, the program for the year ahead is highly accessible, with a roster of artists at the top of their game. Now more than ever is the time to experience opera and to discover just why it's moved hearts and minds for so long.
Two spectacular operas from the Met are coming to The Ridgefield Playhouse as encore productions this month. Verdi's Shakespearean masterpiece Otello stars Johan Botha in the title role opposite acclaimed soprano Renee Fleming as Desdemona today, July 9. On Wednesday, July 16, Handel's The Enchanted Island showcases the talents of William Christie, David Daniels, Joyce DiDonato and Pacido Domingo. These performances start at 6 p.m. Advantages of the HD broadcasts are the interesting camera angles, behind-the-scenes tours and interviews.
Two spectacular operas from the Met are coming to The Ridgefield Playhouse as encore productions this month. Verdi's Shakespearean masterpiece Otello stars Johan Botha in the title role opposite acclaimed soprano Renee Fleming as Desdemona on Wednesday, July 9. On Wednesday, July 16, Handel's The Enchanted Island showcases the talents of William Christie, David Daniels, Joyce DiDonato and Pacido Domingo. These performances start at 6 p.m. Advantages of the HD broadcasts are the interesting camera angles, behind-the-scenes tours and interviews.
Even with its visions of damnation and redemption, Gounod's FAUST, with libretto by Barbier and Carre, is pretty tame stuff. In the wrong hands, it can be dull as well. Well, you can't accuse the Dutch National Opera's new production--by Barcelona's Alex Ollé and the theatre company La Fura dels Baus--of being “dull,” with its prosthetic breasts, Barbie doll chorus and simulated sex.
“The party's over,” wrote Betty Comden & Adolph Green in BELLS ARE RINGING. “It's time to call it a day.” The opera season at the Metropolitan said its farewells to 2013-2014 on May 10 with a bel canto doubleheader of Rossini's LA CENERENTOLA (a shot heard round the world via radio and The Met's LIVE IN HD) and Bellini's IL PURITANI--not a bad swan song, considering the singing talent involved.
The Richard Tucker Music Foundation has announced that Michael Fabiano - 'the tenor that we have all been waiting for' (San Francisco Classical Voice) - is the winner of the 2014 Richard Tucker Award.
Tenor Michael Fabiano has been named the recipient of the ninth annual Beverly Sills Artist Award for young singers at the Metropolitan Opera. The $50,000 award, the largest of its kind in the United States, is designated for extraordinarily gifted singers between the ages of 25 and 40 who have already appeared in featured solo roles at the Met. The award, given in honor of Beverly Sills, was established in 2006 by an endowment gift from former Met board member Agnes Varis, who died in 2011. Ms. Varis was also the founding donor of the Met's Rush Ticket program. Fabiano was presented with the award at the Met today by Met General Manager Peter Gelb.
Nadler, a member of the Met's music staff, has conducted 49 performances with the company since his debut in 1989. Later this season, he will conduct the February 15 performance of Dvo?ák's Rusalka. He has led Met performances of Verdi's Rigoletto, Un Ballo in Maschera, Aida, Don Carlo, and La Traviata; Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia; Wagner's Tannhäuser; Giordano's Andrea Chénier; Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps, Le Rossignol, and Oedipus Rex; Bizet's Carmen; Beethoven's Fidelio; Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin; Gounod's Roméo et Juliette; and Mozart's Die Zauberflöte.
Before seeing the Met's new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s DIE FLEDERMAUS, directed by Jeremy Sams, on Saturday night, I listened to the afternoon's live broadcast of Mozart's THE MAGIC FLUTE. Both were written in German and performed in English to make them more palatable to their target audiences (Broadway musical lovers and young opera-goers-in-training, respectively). But, while the Mozart had its guts cut away, to shave the running time to 90 minutes without an intermission, the FLEDERMAUS went on--and on and on--for four hours. Both had the same result--and it was not good.
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met tonight, December 31, with two Broadway stars appearing. Check out the excerpt from Act II of Johann Strauss's 'Die Fledermaus' with Jane Archibald (Adele), Anthony Roth Costanzo (Orlofsky), Christopher Maltman (Eisenstein).
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met tonight, December 31, with two Broadway stars appearing. Check out the excerpt from the Act I trio of Johann Strauss's 'Die Fledermaus.'
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met tonight, December 31, with two Broadway stars appearing. Check out a first look below!
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met tonight, December 31, with two Broadway stars appearing.
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met on December 31, with two Broadway stars appearing. Check out a preview video below!
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met on December 31. Jeremy Sams, writer and creator of the Met's Baroque pasticheThe Enchanted Island, makes his company debut as director with the new staging, which is set in Vienna at the turn of the 20thcentury. Sams also contributes new lyrics for Strauss's work, which will be performed entirely in English; Tony Award-nominated playwright Douglas Carter Beane makes his Met debut with new dialogue. Adam Fischer conducts a cast of rising opera stars and Broadway performers. The cast is led by Susanna Phillips and Christopher Maltman as the unhappily married Rosalinde and Eisenstein; Jane Archibald as Rosalinde's feisty maid, Adele; Anthony Roth Costanzo as Prince Orlofsky; Michael Fabiano as Rosalinde's former lover, Alfred; Paulo Szot as the bumbling Dr. Falke; and Patrick Carfizzi as the prison superintendent, Frank. Broadway stars Danny Burstein and Betsy Wolfe make Met debuts as the drunken jailer, Frosch, and Adele's sister, Ida. Robert Jones is set and costume designer for the production, with lighting design by Jennifer Schriever and choreography by Stephen Mear in their Met debuts.
On Sunday, January 12, 2014, Opera Index will presents its 35th Distinguished Achievement Award to mezzo-soprano Rosalind Elias, described as one of the finest singing actresses of our time, at its Winter Gala in the Grand Salon of the JW Marriott Essex House, 160 Central Park South, beginning at 6 p.m. with a reception in the Petit Salon. The three-time Grammy and two-time Emmy Award-winning artist made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 1954 and over her half-century-long career, has sung more than 50 roles. Ken Benson, renowned artists manager and longtime Opera Index supporter, will present the award to Ms. Elias.
A new production of Johann Strauss Jr.'s New Year's Eve classic, the comedic operetta Die Fledermaus, will open at the Met on December 31. Jeremy Sams, writer and creator of the Met's Baroque pastiche The Enchanted Island, makes his company debut as director with the new staging, which is set in Vienna at the turn of the 20th century. Sams also contributes new lyrics for Strauss's work, which will be performed entirely in English; Tony Award-nominated playwright Douglas Carter Beane makes his Met debut with new dialogue. Adam Fischer conducts a cast of rising opera stars and Broadway performers. The cast is led by Susanna Phillips and Christopher Maltman as the unhappily married Rosalinde and Eisenstein; Jane Archibald as Rosalinde's feisty maid, Adele; Anthony Roth Costanzo as Prince Orlofsky; Michael Fabiano as Rosalinde's former lover, Alfred; Paulo Szot as the bumbling Dr. Falke; and Patrick Carfizzi as the prison superintendent, Frank. Broadway stars Danny Burstein and Betsy Wolfe make Met debuts as the drunken jailer, Frosch, and Adele's sister, Ida. Robert Jones is set and costume designer for the production, with lighting design by Jennifer Schriever and choreography by Stephen Mear in their Met debuts.
Jane Archibald will sing the role of Adele in all 14 performances of the new production of Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus at the Met this season. Christine Schäfer, originally scheduled to sing the first six performances of the opera, is ill and unable to travel to the Met for rehearsals. Archibald was originally scheduled to sing the final eight performances of the run.
The Canadian Opera Company has announced that Mexican tenor David Lomeli, who was scheduled to perform the role of Rodolfo in the upcoming production of Puccini's La Boheme, has had to withdraw for health reasons. Lomeli was scheduled to sing eight of the production's 12 performances. In his place, the COC has cast two of the most exciting young tenors in the opera world today: Dimitri Pittas (October 3, 6, 9, 12) and Michael Fabiano (October 16, 19, 27, 30). They share the role of Rodolfo with the previously announced Italian-American tenor Eric Margiore (October 18, 22, 25, 29).
