Lucia di Lammermoor 2024 - Articles Page 17

Whether from disease, 19th century #MeToo-style abuse, or unrequited love, Opera Philadelphia's (OP) Festival O18 opening weekend showed us three ways that central female characters lost their grip on reality. While I considered only one of them a total success, audience openness to sometimes-demanding material made it clear that the company has found a formula that strikes at the hearts of opera-goers, new and old.

Paper Mill Playhouse (Mark S. Hoebee-Producing Artistic Director), recipient of the Regional Theatre Tony Award in 2016, launches its 80th milestone season with The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle. The Color Purple is the Tony Award-winning musical revival based upon the novel written by Alice Walker and the Warner Bros./Amblin Entertainment motion picture with a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray. Cast members from the 2015 Broadway revival lead the Paper Mill Playhouse company, including Adrianna Hicks (Aladdin, Sister Act - Germany) as Celie, Carla R. Stewart (Ghost - National Tour, Rent - Regional) as Shug Avery and Carrie Compere (Holler If You Hear Me, Shrek the Musical - National Tour) as Sofia.

Alan D. Marks and Barbara Marks have announced the development of the Broadway bound original musical inspired by the life and art of Jean-Michel Basquiat. Jon Batiste ("The Late Show with Stephen Colbert") has written the music & lyrics and Tony Award Winner John Doyle will direct. The development team is working closely with the Basquiat Estate and have secured the rights to Jean-Michel's art work and personal archives.

The Verdi Chorus 35th anniversary season culminates with its Fall 2018 concert Passione! Opera! for two performances only at the First United Methodist Church in Santa Monica on November 10 and 11 led by Founding Artistic Director Anne Marie Ketchum.   As the only choral group in Southern California that focuses primarily on the dramatic and diverse music for opera chorus, this program, which marks the end of a landmark year for the company, will feature selections from three Verdi operas - Aida, Don Carlo, and the famed chorus 'Va, pensiero,' from Nabucco, as well as operatic sequences from Boito's Mefistofele, Saint-Saens' Samson and Delilah, Catalani's La Wally and Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann.

Portland Opera is thrilled to begin the 2018/19 season with Verdi's La Traviata.  A crown jewel of grand opera, La Traviata tells the story of the brilliant and beautiful Parisian courtesan Violetta Valery as she falls in love with Alfredo Germont. Haunted by her reputation and illness, Violetta navigates sexual politics and confronts societal expectations as she braves a broken heart. Portland Opera will present four performances of La Traviata on November 2, 4 (matinee), 8, and 10 at the Keller Auditorium.

Named for the groundbreaking African American contralto, the Marian Anderson Vocal Award recognizes a young American singer in opera, oratorio, or recital repertoire with outstanding promise for a significant career. Washington National Opera (WNO) named bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green as the 2018 recipient earlier this year and is pleased to present him in concert on Thursday, October 4 at 7:30 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Tickets are $39.

Anna Netrebko makes her Met role debut in the title role of the enslaved Ethiopian princess in Verdi's tragedy of ancient Egypt, Aida, opening September 26. Anita Rachvelishvili sings the role of her formidable rival, Amneris, following the Georgian soprano's critically acclaimed portrayal of Azucena in Verdi's Il Trovatore last season. The cast also features Aleksandrs Antonenko as the warrior Radames, Quinn Kelsey as Aida's father, Amonasro, Dmitry Belosselskiy as the high priest Ramfis, and Ryan Speedo Green as the King, under the baton of Nicola Luisotti. The October 6 matinee will be transmitted worldwide, kicking off the Met's new Live in HD series, now reaching more than 2,000 movie theaters in 73 countries around the world.

Puccini's La Bohème, the most-performed opera in Met history, returns to the repertory in the opening week of the 2018-19 season, with 11 performances of Franco Zeffirelli's beloved production from September 25. Initial performances feature three much anticipated Met debuts

San Francisco Opera today announced a cast change for Gaetano Donizetti's Roberto Devereux, opening September 8 and running for six performances through September 27. Romanian-American baritone Andrew G. Manea will perform the role of the Duke of Nottingham, replacing Artur Rucinski who has withdrawn due to lung injuries sustained in a serious bicycling accident involving a car in his native Poland. He is expected to make a full recovery. Rucinski deeply regrets having to withdraw but looks forward to returning to San Francisco Opera in the future.

The Eli and Edythe Broad Stage's 2018-19 Celebrity Opera Series opens with one of the most acclaimed sopranos in the world, Sonya Yoncheva, with Domingo Hindoyan, conductor, on Wednesday, November 7 at 7:30pm.  Zachary Woolfe said in The New York Times, "Yoncheva is a performer that I'd seek out, no matter what she does."  Tickets for members are now on sale.  Tickets for the general public will go on sale on Wednesday, September 12.

Opera Philadelphia – “one of the most creative and ambitious companies in this country” (New York Times) – is set to take the opera world by storm once again, as it looks forward to O18, the second installment of its pioneering Festival O, with the “spirit ... not to follow taste but to lead it” (Philadelphia Inquirer). Festival 018comprises five operatic happenings – two world premieres, two new productions, and a three-part cabaret event – at multiple venues across the city from September 20-30, and features two superstar opera divas: coloratura soprano Brenda Rae and mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, co-stars of Opera Philadelphia's acclaimed spring 2017 production of Rossini's Tancredi. Rae headlines a new production of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor from celebrated director and designer Laurent Pelly that anchors both the O18 festival and the company's year-round Opera at the Academy series. Blythe (aka Blythely Oratonio) takes the stage at Philadelphia's Theatre of Living Arts (TLA) for a three-night, three-part cabaret takeover titled Queens of the Night, along with self-described “drag queen king” Dito van Reigersberg (aka Martha Graham Cracker). It all leads up to a reprise performance of Dito & Aeneas: Two Queens, One Night, Opera Philadelphia's 2017 cabaret-play spectacular, which was hailed as “smart and bubbly in all the right places” (Philadelphia Inquirer). The two divas even perform together on the TLA stage, when Rae makes a special guest appearance opposite Blythe, comedically echoing the tragic lovers of Tancredi. 

Opera Philadelphia is set to take the opera world by storm once again, as it looks forward to O18, the second installment of its pioneering Festival O.

You can't accuse Opera Philadelphia's O18 Festival--running September 20-30 at various city venues--of being predictable. But no one would chastise you if you were to think: How do you follow-up what seems like a once-in-a-lifetime event, last year's O17? Well, as Monty Python used to say, 'And now for something completely different...'

Paper Mill Playhouse has announced casting for The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award winner John Doyle. Cast members from the 2015 Broadway revival lead the Paper Mill Playhouse company, including Adrianna Hicks (Aladdin, Sister Act - Germany) as Celie, Carla R. Stewart (Ghost - National Tour, Rent - Regional) as Shug Avery and Carrie Compere (Holler If You Hear Me,Shrek the Musical - National Tour) as Sofia. 

San Francisco Opera today announced a cast change for Gaetano Donizetti's Roberto Devereux, opening September 8 and running for six performances through September 27. Romanian-American baritone Andrew G. Manea will perform the role of the Duke of Nottingham, replacing Artur Rucinski who has withdrawn due to lung injuries sustained in a serious bicycling accident involving a car in his native Poland. He is expected to make a full recovery. Rucinski deeply regrets having to withdraw but looks forward to returning to San Francisco Opera in the future.

Tenri Cultural Institute proudly presents The Chamber Music of Dana Dimitri Richardson on Sunday, October 14th at 3pm. The program features world premieres and recent works performed by pianists Craig Ketter, Simon Mulligan, and Cathy Callis, soprano Jacqueline Milena Thompson, saxophonist Mark Engebretson, and Canta Libre Chamber Ensemble.

Lauded as “one of the most creative and ambitious companies in this country” (New York Times), Opera Philadelphia justified that reputation once again when it launched its inaugural Festival O last season; the Washington Post found it “one of the most enjoyable additions to the fall calendar in years,” and the Philadelphia Inquirer noted the festival's ambition “not to follow taste but to lead it.”

On September 15th, Opera San Jose's 35th season opens with Mozart's comedy The Abduction from the Seraglio. The opera was commissioned by Emperor Joseph II, and as the myth goes when he first heard it, he complained to Mozart, 'That is too fine for my ears - there are too many notes.' Mozart replied, 'There are just as many notes as there should be.'

Lookingglass Theatre Company announces casting for the world premiere of The Steadfast Tin Soldier: A Christmas Pantomime, from the story by Hans Christian Andersen, conceived and directed by Ensemble Member Mary Zimmerman. This family-friendly, holiday show runs November 7, 2018 - January 13, 2019 at Lookingglass Theatre Company, located inside Chicago's historic Water Tower Water Works, 821 N. Michigan Ave. at Pearson. 

The Old Globe and University of San Diego Shiley Graduate Theatre Program today announced the hire of Jesse J. Perez as its new Director. Perez is an accomplished actor, choreographer, director, and professor who comes to San Diego after 12 years of distinguished teaching at The Juilliard School in New York.

Continuing its celebratory 35th Anniversary Season, The Verdi Chorus (Anne Marie Ketchum, Founding Artistic Director), announced today that auditions will be held on Saturday, August 25, 2018 at the First United Methodist Church in Santa Monica for The Verdi Chorus Fall 2018 Concert.