At the Dallas Opera, Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s adaptation of the memoir by Jean-Dominique Bauby movingly depicts the writer’s experience of being left speechless and almost entirely immobile by a stroke. By Heidi Waleson Nov. 6, 2023 at 5:33 pm ET ‘The Diving Bell and the Butterfly’ at the Dallas Opera PHOTO: KYLE FLUBACKER Dallas …
Continue reading “‘The Diving Bell and the Butterfly’ Review: A Story of Paralysis Takes Flight”
Composer Jeanine Tesori and librettist George Brant’s world premiere at the Washington National Opera follows a female fighter pilot who is reassigned to flying drones. By Heidi Waleson Oct. 31, 2023 at 5:16 pm ET A scene from ‘Grounded’ PHOTO: SCOTT SUCHMAN/THE KENNEDY CENTER Washington ‘Grounded,” a two-act opera by Jeanine Tesori and George Brant, which had its world premiere …
Continue reading “‘Grounded’ Review: An Opera on War Waged at a Distance”
The composer’s new work, which had its premiere at Houston Grand Opera in a production by Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, follows a Confederate landowner and an enslaved woman in her household as they run a Union espionage ring during the Civil War. By Heidi Waleson Oct. 25, 2023 at 5:34 pm ET Jamie Barton and …
Continue reading “‘Intelligence’ Review: Jake Heggie’s Songs for Spies”
Kate Soper’s opera, which had its premiere at New York’s Miller Theatre last week, adapts a medieval legend about virgins used to trap unicorns; David T. Little’s work, performed by Philadelphia’s The Crossing, stems from the bygone practice of paying social outcasts to absorb the sins of the wealthy dead. By Heidi Waleson Oct. 17, …
Continue reading “‘The Hunt’ and ‘Sin-Eater’ Reviews: New Songs of Old Worlds”
With Ivo van Hove’s new staging of Jake Heggie’s opera about Sister Helen Prejean’s role as an adviser to a man condemned to die, the Met continues to embrace contemporary works. By Heidi Waleson Oct. 3, 2023 at 5:06 pm ET Wendy Bryn Harmer, Rod Gilfry, Joyce DiDonato, Krysty Swann and Chauncey Packer PHOTO: KAREN ALMOND …
Continue reading “‘Dead Man Walking’ Review: A Death-Row Drama at the Metropolitan Opera”
Opera Philadelphia’s Festival O featured a triumphant world premiere about Nellie Bly’s work exposing the conditions at a 19th-century asylum, as well as a production of Verdi’s convoluted love story; director Claus Guth and tenor Jonas Kaufmann staged a gripping performance of Schubert’s ‘Schwanengesang’ (‘Swan Song’) at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. Heidi …
Boston Lyric Opera’s production, the result of a yearslong effort to reconsider Puccini’s classic in the wake of anti-Asian violence, is thoughtful but low on passion; in New York, recitals by Julia Bullock and Lise Davidsen included obscure songs and classic repertoire alike. By Heidi Waleson Sept. 19, 2023 at 5:46 pm ET Karen Chia-Ling …
Continue reading “‘Madama Butterfly’ Review: Coming Out of Its Chrysalis”
In its first season under director Rob Ainsley, the upstate New York opera festival counted among its offerings a riveting rendition of Handel’s ‘Rinaldo’ and a vivid staging of ‘Candide.’ By Heidi Waleson Aug. 15, 2023 at 5:49 pm ET Korin Thomas-Smith, Keely Futterer and Anthony Roth Costanzo in ‘Rinaldo’ PHOTO: EVAN ZIMMERMAN Cooperstown, N.Y. Starting in …
Continue reading “Glimmerglass Festival Review: From Baroque to Bernstein”
In this year’s festival, Monteverdi’s myth about lost lovers in the underworld takes the stage; Debussy’s Symbolist story finds orchestral triumph; Dvořák’s fairy tale takes a Freudian turn; and more. By Heidi Waleson Aug. 8, 2023 at 5:42 pm ET Luke Harnish, Rolando Villazón, Lauren Snouffer, Luke Elmer and Le Bu PHOTO: CURTIS BROWN Santa Fe, N.M. …
At Lincoln Center, Teatro Nuovo presents two bel canto works—one, by Donizetti, featuring Christian martyrs and the other, by Federico and Luigi Ricci, a fairy godmother; upstate, a Bard SummerScape production of Camille Saint-Saëns’s historical drama captures a king’s tyranny. By Heidi Waleson July 24, 2023 at 5:52 pm ET Ricardo José Rivera and Chelsea …
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