Heartbeat Opera gives ‘Macbeth’ a spare, putatively feminist reinterpretation and stages ‘Tosca’ as a production put on in a fundamentalist theocracy By Heidi Waleson April 18, 2023 6:02 pm ET Lisa Algozzini Photo: Russ Rowland Heartbeat Opera, which specializes in rethinking classic titles for contemporary audiences, opened its first fully staged new productions in 3 1/2 years at …
Continue reading “‘Lady M’ and ‘Tosca’ Review: Verdi and Puccini Imagined Anew”
The composer’s second opera at the New York institution is a visceral, jazz-influenced work about the closeted bisexual boxer Emile Griffith, who killed his opponent in a 1962 fight. Ryan Speedo Green PHOTO: KEN HOWARD / MET OPERA By Heidi Waleson April 12, 2023 5:55 pm ET New York After its huge success with the New York …
Continue reading “‘Champion’ Review: Terence Blanchard Comes Back to the Met”
A performance comprising three works by artists including Anna Deavere Smith and John Luther Adams received a technically spectacular production at Lyric Opera of Chicago; at Chicago Opera Theater, an opera about the brilliant British mathematician proved a labored telling of a tragic story. Gordon Hawkins as Preacher Man, Issachah Savage as Curtis Toler, and …
At the Seattle Opera, filmmaker Roya Sadat directs a timely but trite adaptation of Khaled Hosseini’s novel, with music by Sheila Silver and a libretto by Stephen Kitsakos. Maureen McKay and Karin Mushegain PHOTO: SUNNY MARTINI By Heidi Waleson March 6, 2023 5:27 pm ET Seattle ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns,” by composer Sheila Silver and librettist Stephen Kitsakos, which had …
Continue reading “‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’ Review: Arias in Afghanistan”
In director François Girard’s production of the operatic fairy tale, powerful turns from Piotr Beczała and Christine Goerke compete with a series of questionable design choices. A scene from Wagner’s ‘Lohengrin’ PHOTO: MARTY SOHL/METROPOLITAN OPERA By Heidi Waleson New York The Metropolitan Opera returned from its monthlong hiatus on Sunday afternoon with Wagner’s “Lohengrin,” last seen at …
Continue reading “‘Lohengrin’ Review: Color-Coded Wagner at the Metropolitan Opera”
Composer and librettist Kate Soper’s inventive, uneven adaptation of a 13th-century French poem at Long Beach Opera explores the messiness of romantic love. Laurel Irene and Lucas Steele PHOTO: JORDAN GEIGER By Heidi Waleson Feb. 21, 2023 6:11 pm ET San Pedro, Calif. ‘Le Roman de la Rose,” a 13th-century, 21,000-line poem written in Old French, is …
Continue reading “The Romance of the Rose’ Review: An Opera on Love’s Disorder”
This year’s edition of the adventurous showcase includes an intimate double bill by Irish composer Emma O’Halloran and a dazzling, uncategorizable work by Gelsey Bell that spans geologic time A scene from ‘Morning//Mourning’ PHOTO: MARIA BARANOVA By Heidi Waleson Jan. 10, 2023 7:18 pm ET With the 10th anniversary season of the Prototype Festival under way, it’s …
Continue reading “Prototype Festival Review: Operas Personal and Planetary”
Umberto Giordano’s 1898 verismo work has a creaky plot but an engaging score, beautifully delivered by soprano Sonya Yoncheva in a handsome new production at the Metropolitan Opera Sonya Yoncheva PHOTO: KEN HOWARD / MET OPERA By Heidi Waleson Jan. 4, 2023 5:26 pm ET Umberto Giordano’s “Fedora” (1898) proved to be perfect New Year’s Eve fare …
Continue reading “‘Fedora’ Review: How the Met Toasted the New Year”
Kelli O’Hara, Renée Fleming and Joyce DiDonato in ‘The Hours’ PHOTO: EVAN ZIMMERMAN / MET OPERA By Heidi Waleson Nov. 29, 2022 at 1:05 pm New York ‘The Hours,” by composer Kevin Puts and librettist Greg Pierce, which had its world-premiere staged production at the Metropolitan Opera last Tuesday, is clever in concept. Its sources—the 1998 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Michael …
A magical world premiere at San Diego Opera imagines Frida Kahlo reuniting with her husband, Diego Rivera, from beyond the grave; composer Ethel Smyth’s 1906 work, in a fusty revival at Houston Grand Opera, depicts English villagers who plunder shipwrecks and kill the survivors. Guadalupe Paz and Alfredo Daza PHOTO: KARLI CADEL By Heidi Waleson Nov. 1, …
Continue reading “‘El último sueño de Frida y Diego’ and ‘The Wreckers’ Reviews: The Music of Death”
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