I covered the first two productions of San Francisco Opera’s 2026-27 season for Musical America: Simon Boccanegra and Mary, Queen of Scots.
Filed under: Musical America, review, San Francisco Opera, Verdi, women composers
October 7, 2026 • 3:17 pm 0
Memory and Power: Two Leaders Under Siege at San Francisco Opera
July 31, 2025 • 12:32 pm Comments Off on Showbiz and Shadows: ‘Rigoletto’ at Santa Fe Opera
Showbiz and Shadows: ‘Rigoletto’ at Santa Fe Opera
It’s great to be back in Santa Fe. Here’s my take on the first of this week’s five productions @Santa Fe Opera:
Santa Fe Opera’s new Rigoletto delivers flashes of vitality that help compensate for a staging that is often muddled. From the outset, Carlo Montanaro’s conducting signalled an intense level of involvement from the orchestra. The opening curse motif, stated a touch more aggressively than usual, is as emphatic as an oracle. …
Filed under: review, Santa Fe Opera, Verdi
May 26, 2020 • 1:22 am Comments Off on Verdi’s Ernani at the Met
Verdi’s Ernani at the Met
The current offering from the Met’s streaming program is Verdi’s opera Ernani, based on a Victor Hugo play and premiered in 1844.
Here’s the program note I wrote long ago for this 2012 production, which stars Angela Meade, Marcello Giordani, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, and Ferruccio Furlanetto, with Marco Armiliato conducting.
Filed under: Metropolitan Opera, Verdi
September 23, 2019 • 12:50 am Comments Off on La forza del regie: Frank Castorf’s Deutsche Oper Debut
La forza del regie: Frank Castorf’s Deutsche Oper Debut
Tenor Russell Thomas (Don Alvaro) and baritone Markus Brück (Don Carlo) in Frank Castorf’s staging of La forza del destino at Deutsche Oper Credit: Thomas Aurin
Frank Castorf has long been an avant-garde institution in Berlin, but he just made his debut at Deutsche Oper with a staging of Verdi’s La forza del destino that sparked audience mutiny. Here’s my review for Musical America.
BERLIN — Booing can be a badge of honor in Germany’s theaters, particularly when it comes to canonical works. That’s at least one way of regarding the vehement reactions that have greeted Frank Castorf’s new staging of La forza del destino at Deutsche Oper…
Filed under: Deutsche Oper, directors, Frank Castorf, review, Verdi
August 12, 2019 • 9:03 am Comments Off on Timelessly Timely: A Dark and Damning Rigoletto at Seattle Opera
Timelessly Timely: A Dark and Damning Rigoletto at Seattle Opera
Madison Leonard (Gilda) and Lester Lynch (Rigoletto); (c) Sunny Martini
Seattle Opera has just launched its new season under incoming General Director Christina Scheppelmann with a new Rigoletto production. Here’s my review:
Recounting one of the bleakest, cruelest narratives in the core repertoire, Rigoletto depicts a noirish world of sexual predation, misogyny, despotism, revenge, murder, and… horrifically bad luck. Should all this be approached as timeless tragedy, timely social commentary – or merely as a guilty pleasure akin to consuming a thriller?
Filed under: directors, review, Seattle Opera, Verdi
October 4, 2017 • 10:24 am Comments Off on The Memorable Women at San Francisco Opera Continue, with La Traviata and Turandot
The Memorable Women at San Francisco Opera Continue, with La Traviata and Turandot
Aurelia Florian as Violetta Valéry in Verdi’s “La Traviata.” Photo: Cory Weaver/San Francisco Opera
Part two of my reviews of San Francisco Opera’s fall season is now posted on Musical America:
SAN FRANCISCO—Along with a sensational production of Elektra , San Francisco Opera’s lineup so far this season is spotlighting some of the art form’s most gripping female …
continue reading (behind Musical America‘s paywall)
Filed under: Puccini, review, San Francisco Opera, Verdi
January 17, 2017 • 8:00 am Comments Off on New Take on Old Favorite: La traviata at Seattle Opera
New Take on Old Favorite: La traviata at Seattle Opera
La traviata director Mika Blauensteiner, in rehearsal at Seattle Opera
This familiar story of Violetta, her love, and death is the world’s most-performed opera. With new staging that marks the North American debut of the German director Peter Konwitschny, Seattle Opera hopes to shed fresh light on Verdi’s 1853 masterpiece.
Filed under: directors, Seattle Opera, Seattle Times, Verdi
June 20, 2016 • 10:15 am Comments Off on Verdi at His Most Ambitious
Verdi at His Most Ambitious
My essay for San Francisco Opera’s program: Don Carlo, part of the final trio of operas in David Gockley’s farewell season:
“Don Carlos has really thrilled him. I think that this drama, instinct as it is with real passion, is just what he needs,” reported Léon Escudier, Verdi’s French publisher, after a trip to visit the composer in 1865.
He was sounding Verdi out on some possible topics for a fresh commission from the Paris Opéra. Another idea that aroused Verdi’s interest was King Lear—a project he had long hoped to realize—but Verdi opted for Don Carlos, a historical tragedy by Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805), as more suitable for treatment in the French grand opera style.
Filed under: essay, San Francisco Opera, Verdi
August 9, 2015 • 4:24 pm Comments Off on Seattle Opera’s Nabucco Falls Flat
Seattle Opera’s Nabucco Falls Flat
The cast and orchestra of Seattle Opera’s Nabucco. © Philip Newton
My Bachtrack review is now live.
(I think I managed to catch all the autocorrects that
were turning “Nabucco” into “Nabisco.”)
On paper, Seattle Opera’s new production of Nabucco sounded enticing. General Director Aidan Lang generated buzz about the ‘innovative staging concept’ we should anticipate for the company’s first-ever presentation of Verdi’s third opera. Seattle Opera had meanwhile undertaken a rebranding effort that included a design facelift of its website to emphasise large, bold visuals — with billboard-style tags announcing Nabucco: ‘BETRAYED’ ‘TWISTED’ “EPIC’.
Filed under: directors, review, Seattle Opera, Verdi
August 7, 2015 • 1:22 pm Comments Off on The Standard Rep at Santa Fe Opera: Summer 2015
The Standard Rep at Santa Fe Opera: Summer 2015
Alex Penda as Salome; photo © Ken Howard for Santa Fe Opera, 2015
Along with my Cold Mountain coverage, here’s the round-up review of three opera productions I wrote for Musical America, in the order in which they impressed me: Salome, Rigoletto, and The Daughter of the Regiment). (Sorry for the paywall, which prevents me from presenting the whole text here.)
SANTA FE — With the world premiere of Cold Mountain and the announcement of a newly commissioned opera about Steve Jobs by Mason Bates, Santa Fe Opera has been in the media spotlight over the past week. The company is also emphasizing its versatility in this summer’s three productions of familiar fare.
Filed under: directors, Donizetti, review, Richard Strauss, Santa Fe Opera, Verdi
