Rossini | MEMETERIA by Thomas May

May 1, 2024 • 10:17 am 0

Valentina Peleggi at Seattle Opera

Conductor Valentina Peleggi will conduct Seattle Opera’s upcoming “The Barber of Seville.” (Chris Beasley)

The young Italian conductor Valentina Peleggi make her Seattle Opera debut this weekend in a revival of Lindy Hume’s popular production of The Barber of Seville, running through 19 May. In advance of the opening, I wrote a profile of Peleggi for the Seattle Times:

No matter how many times you’ve seen “The Barber of Seville” — let alone heard the hit tune that Figaro, the title character, sings as his first entrance — you can expect fresh insights into this well-known score under Valentina Peleggi’s baton….

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Filed under: conductors, Rossini, Seattle Opera

April 30, 2021 • 8:05 am Comments Off on Rossini at the Drive-In, as San Francisco Opera Returns

Rossini at the Drive-In, as San Francisco Opera Returns

San Francisco Opera is presenting a fully staged opera before a live audience for the first time in 16 months. I wrote about the opening for The New York Times.

SAN FRANCISCO — It feels almost too good to be true after a pandemic closure of Wagnerian scale: an audience watching a cast of singers enter the War Memorial Opera House here to rehearse and perform Rossini’s classic comedy “The Barber of Seville”….

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Filed under: New York Times, Rossini, San Francisco Opera

August 8, 2018 • 8:35 am Comments Off on Santa Fe Opera 2018: Ariadne, L’italiana, and Butterfly

Santa Fe Opera 2018: Ariadne, L’italiana, and Butterfly

ANA MARÍA MARTÍNEZ (MADAME BUTTERFLY) AND JOSHUA GUERRERO (F.B. PINKERTON). PHOTO CREDIT: KEN HOWARD FOR SANTA FE OPERA, 2018

Here’s my report on the rest of the 2018 summer season at Santa Fe Opera* for Musical America. I write about Ariadne auf Naxos, L’italiana in Algeri, and Madama Butterfly. My review of the company’s new production of Doctor Atomic is here.

Santa Fe, NM—-During the long reign of founder John Crosby, Santa Fe Opera cultivated its reputation as a “Strauss house.” Yet only three of the composer’s operas had been presented under the company’s third general director, Charles MacKay, before he decided to include a brand-new production of Ariadne auf Naxos as a key attraction of his farewell season.

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[PDF here: Santa Fe 2018 MA reviews]
*Apart from Candide, the one production I had to miss.

Filed under: Musical America, Puccini, review, Rossini, Santa Fe Opera, Strauss

July 31, 2016 • 9:22 am Comments Off on High Notes and High Jinks: Lawrence Brownlee as Count Ory

High Notes and High Jinks: Lawrence Brownlee as Count Ory

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Lawrence Brownlee; photo (c) Johnny Andrews/The Seattle Times

My profile of Lawrence Brownlee is out in today’s Seattle Times. The world-class tenor is back in town to star in Rossini’s Count Ory at Seattle Opera:

He’s in demand around the globe, a favorite of music lovers at the most prestigious venues for classical music.

But Lawrence Brownlee reserves a special fondness for Seattle.

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Filed under: Lawrence Brownlee, Rossini, Seattle Opera, singers

August 28, 2014 • 7:51 am Comments Off on William Tell at the Edinburgh International Festival

William Tell at the Edinburgh International Festival

: Gianandrea Noseda

My review of William Tell, given a concert performance by Gianandrea Noseda and the Teatro Regio Torino at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall, is now live on Bachtrack:

A conspiracy theorist might ponder whether the programming of William Tell during the final week of the 2014 Edinburgh International Festival, the day after the Salmond-Darling Scottish independence debate on the BBC, was intended as a propaganda move in support of the “yes” campaign.

Certainly the fervour of the opera’s grand finale, as the Swiss rise up in triumphant revolt against their hated imperial overlords, is so palpably rousing as to make one at least question the commonplace assumption of Rossini’s indifference to political matters.

And in a coincidence sure to fuel our conspiracist’s fantasies, the Milanese censor gave the green light for the opera’s staging at La Scala – several years after its 1829 première in Paris – only on condition that the setting be changed to Scotland, with the protagonist restyled as “Guglielmo Vallace”, and a name change from Gualtiero to “Kirkpatrick”.

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Filed under: conductors, opera, review, Rossini