Opera
A musical reflection for a father-less Father's Day
The death of my father in February makes for a bittersweet Father's Day this year. It's strange when you no longer have to find a card and try to come up with a gift idea. Read more ...
'Approaching Ali' enters operatic ring, shows promise
New operas don't often score knock-outs. But, if crowd response were the determining factor, "Approaching Ali" sure sounded like a champion Saturday night at the Kennedy Center, where Washington National Opera presented the premiere of this hour-long piece. Read more ...
A sublime way to take note of Wagner's birthday
OK, I couldn't just offer the mirth of Midweek Madness to mark the Wagner bicentennial today. (I think it quite decent of the old chap to have his 200th birthday fall on a Wednesday, so I could slip him into my weekly, widely and wildly clamored for featurette.) Read more ...
Figaro Project gives admirable premiere of 'Camelot Requiem'
Since "Nixon in China," the 1987 masterwork by John Adams that launched what some wag described as a new genre labeled "CNN Opera," contemporary events have been fairer game than ever for composers and librettists. Read more ...
Verdi, Puccini, Poulenc for 2013-2014 season at the Lyric
The 2013-2014 opera season at the Modell Performing Arts Center at The Lyric will have a lot in common with the 2012-2013 season -- staged works by Verdi and Puccini produced by Lyric Opera Baltimore, with a concert in between. Read more ...
Washington National Opera presents revelatory 'Show Boat'
Time was when American opera companies considered musicals as suspect artifacts from another planet, hardly worthy of serious attention -- not even on a par with the operettas those companies would occasionally stage when they needed a box office lift. Read more ...
Lyric Opera Baltimore presents lively concert of bel canto
The best sign of Lyric Opera Baltimore's growth would be an expansion of the company's fully staged productions, which are down to two after an inaugural season of three. But the idea of putting a concert into the lineup as filler for the second season certainly has merit and, judging by the decent-sized, enthusiastic turnout Saturday night at the Lyric Opera House, marketability. Read more ...
80th birthday salute to the fabulous Montserrat Caballe
Last Friday was the 80th birthday of one of my vocal idols, Montserrat Caballe. I offer these belated good wishes with a sampling of the Spanish soprano's radiant tone and sublime musicality in a Strauss song. They just don't make 'em like this anymore. Feliz cumpleanos, Madame Caballe. Read more ...
Baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky to give recital for Washington Performing Arts Society
Dmitri Hvorostovsky, the Russian baritone who will give a recital for the Washington Performing Arts Society at the Kennedy Center Wednesday night, has one of the finest voices of our time. He doesn’t mind saying so himself. Read more ...
Washington National Opera's 'Manon Lescaut,' 'Norma' hit mark with Racette, Meade
It's easy to find opera lovers who dismiss the present state of the art in favor of some distant "golden age." Actually, it has always been that way. Read more ...
Kennedy Center's 2013-14 season showcases hip-hop, international theater
The Kennedy Center plans to shake up the Foggy Bottom hood next season. As part of its 2013-2014 lineup, the center will showcase a global pop music phenomenon. Really? Shizzle, man. Read more ...
Opera Philadelphia offers East Coast premiere of Kevin Puts' 'Silent Night'
The last pope to take the name Benedict, before the one who made history this month announcing plans to retire, assumed his duties a few weeks after the outbreak of World War I. As Christmas 1914 approached, Benedict XV, who described the war as “the suicide of Europe,” pleaded for a Christmas truce. The military leaders refused, but somehow, at several points along the trenches, a surreal cease-fire broke out anyway. That short, peaceful spell inspired the 2005 film “Joyeux Noel,” which focused on the experiences of some Scottish, French and German troops on a battlefield in Belgium. That film, in turn, inspired “Silent Night,” an opera by Kevin Puts, the Peabody Institute faculty member who received the Pulitzer Prize in music last year for this extraordinary work. Opera Philadelphia is presenting the East Coast premiere of “Silent Night” at the Academy of Music in an impressive co-production with Minnesota Opera, which commissioned and unveiled the piece in November 2011. (The final performance is Sunday.) Music history is not ... Read more ...
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