Opera News articles from August 2000

Opera News archives from August 2000

OPERA WATCH.
August 1, 2000... A Met debut and farewell at Carnegie Hall, Blythe's first Fricka in Seattle, La Traviata 1900 on PBS STEPHEN ENDELMAN is writing for the stars nowadays. The English-born composer created the soundtrack Passport to the Universe for the...

SOUND BITES: Jennifer Dudley.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... Whenever she needs a good laugh, Jennifer Dudley thinks about some of the career advice she's been given. Early on, she was warned that she was in danger of being typed as a Baroque singer. "As if getting lots of offers to sing Handel and Bach...

ON THE BEAT.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... Milnes launches Opera Aegean; a '70s movie favorite is set to music "Oh, no, the baby just spit up," says SHERRILL MILNES, speaking from Barcelona, where he's appearing with JOSE CARRERAS in Wolf-Ferrari's Sly.Milnes's wife, Greek-American...

DESIGN FOR A LIVING.
August 1, 2000... COSTUMERS DISCUSS TRICKS OF THE TRADE WITH HENRY SCHICKERING For better or worse, the visual age in which we are living has had a profound influence on opera. For the costume designer, there's more pressure now than ever to create...

WHEN DIVAS RULED.
August 1, 2000... In today's opera world, costumes must fit into an overall production concept. But there was a time when singers asserted their individuality by having their own costumes made for them. ERIC MYERS remembers when divas ran the show Life...

VALENTINA'S DAY.
August 1, 2000... FROM PONSELLE TO KIRSTEN, "A"-LIST GLAMOUR DIVAS DEPENDED ON THE BRILLIANT RUSSIAN COUTURIERE They trot the garment out regularly for display. It shimmers quietly in its showcase, arguably the most beautiful, certainly the chicest, opera...

Worst Dressed List.(opera singers describe their most embarrassing costumes)
August 1, 2000... SINGERS REVEAL THEIR MOST EMBARRASSING COSTUMES EVER When you ask an opera singer "What was your least favorite costume?" you have to wait a while for an answer. First there are the laughs and groans, then a virtual catalogue aria of...

METROPOLITAN WARDROBE.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... DRAWINGS AND COSTUMES FROM THE METROPOLITAN OPERA ARCHIVES Gown and cape worn by American contralto Louise Homer (1871-1947) as Ortrud in LOHENGRIN. Homer sang her first Met Ortrud in 1901. Gift of her daughters, Anne Homer Doerfinger...

Perfect Fit.
August 1, 2000... ERIC MYERS speaks with Barbara Matera, doyenne of costume builders Whether you call her a costume builder or a costume executor, Barbara Matera has spent her life in the theater, clothing some of the greatest stars of opera, musicals,...

HANDEL: Alcina.(Review)
August 1, 2000... HANDEL: Alcina [] Fleming, Dessay, Su. Graham, K. Kuhlmann, Lascarro; Robinson, Naouri; Les Arts Florissants, Christie. Text and translations. Erato 8573-80233-3 (3) Amid the coloratura storms of Handel's Alcina (1735) lies a tragedy about...

PUCCINI: Manon Lescaut.(Review)
August 1, 2000... PUCCINI: Manon Lescaut [] Guleghina, Banditelli; Cura, Gallo, Roni, Berti; Chorus and Orchestra of La Scala, Muti. Text and translation. Deutsche Grammophon DG 289 463 186-2 Once upon a time opera recordings fell into two distinct...

WEILL: Die Burgschaft.(Review)
August 1, 2000... WEILL: Die Burgschaft [] Thompson, Panagulias; Burchinal, Travis; Westminster Choir, Spoleto Festival USA Orchestra, Rudel. Text and translations. EMI 5-56976-2 (2) In a career of encyclopedic scope and versatility, Julius Rudel has been a...

MONTEMEZZI: L'Amore dei Tre Re.(Review)
August 1, 2000... MONTEMEZZI: L'Amore dei Tre Re [] Mazzola-Gavazzeni; Haddock, Pyatnychko, Rydl, Nasrawi; Bregenz Festival 1998, Fedoseyev. Text and translation. Koch/Schwann 3-6570 (2) This piece of late-verismo neo-medievalism, one of numerous spin-offs...

J. STRAUSS: Die Fledermaus.(Review)
August 1, 2000... J. STRAUSS: Die Fledermaus [] Pieczonka, Gruberova, Oprisanu; T. Moser, J. Schneider, Tichy, Hornik; Chorus and Orchestra of the Hungarian State Opera, Haider. Text and English translation. Nightingale Classics NC 000058-2 (Koch, dist.) ...

KREUTZER: Gesange aus Goethes Faust.(Review)
August 1, 2000... KREUTZER: Gesange aus Goethes Faust [] Browner; S. Genz, Schelomianski; Hans, piano; Freiburger Vokalensemble; SWR Arts 47563-2 (Allegro, dist.) As you wend your way down Vienna's Dorotheergasse on the way to an auction at the famed...

SONGS OF NED ROREM.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Susan Graham [] "SONGS OF NED ROREM" Martineau, piano; Ensemble Oriol: Plath, violin; Gottschick, viola; F. Ludwig, cello. Erato 8573-80222-2 Songs by Ned Rorem have been appearing regularly for more than fifty years now, so it is no...

DEBUSSY MELODIES.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Francois Le Roux [] "DEBUSSY MELODIES" Lee, piano. Texts and translations. Le Chant du Monde LDC 2781115 (Harmonia Mundi, dist.) Two long-lost melodies by Claude Debussy were discovered nine years ago in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris,...

DEBUSSY & CHAUSSON.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Christine Schafer [] "DEBUSSY & CHAUSSON: MELODIES" with Doufexis; Gage, piano. Texts and translations. DG 289 459 682-2 Two long-lost melodies by Claude Debussy were discovered nine years ago in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, lying...

THE COMPLETE VICTOR AND ELECTROLA RECORDINGS.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Julia Culp [] "THE COMPLETE VICTOR AND ELECTROLA RECORDINGS [1914-26] "Songs and arias by Schubert, R. Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Wagner, Saint-Saens and others; Bos, Raucheisen and Lindemann, piano; various orchestras, W. B. Rogers, J....

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: PARIS.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Much of the success of Opera Bastille's new Les Contes d'Hoffmann, transformed by director Robert Carsen into a backstage drama, was due to Michael Levine's wonderfully inventive stage designs. Opera Bastille scored another hit this...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: LONDON.(Brief Article)(Review)
August 1, 2000... Opera companies bent on commemorating the 250th anniversary of the death of Johann Sebastian Bach encounter a problem: he didn't write any operas. So it was a questionable decision on the part of English National Opera to co-opt a work that...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: GLASGOW.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... Luc Bondy's production of Don Carlos four years ago was widely admired and seen in Europe, and if his staging of Macbeth for Scottish Opera did not live up to that achievement, it was often a cogent, intelligent response to the work. Most...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: FUSSEN, GERMANY.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... King Ludwig of Bavaria's not-so-charmed life (1845-86) has been the subject of more than 5,000 books, plays, movies, poems and dances (the most famous being Luchino Visconti's 1973 film Ludwig, starring Helmut Berger). The latest installment in...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: SALZBURG.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... Political infighting in fourteenth-century Genoa provides the basic plot of Simon Boccanegra, and political infighting between the two Salzburg Festival directors (Claudio Abbado at Easter and Gerard Mortier in the summer) has prevented the...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: HOUSTON.(Review)
August 1, 2000... Carlisle Floyd's Cold Sassy Tree, given its premiere on April 14 by Houston Grand Opera, is clearly from the same pen as Susannah, now nearly half a century old. Cold Sassy Tree, based on an Olive Burns novel about the corn-pone South, contains...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: NEW YORK CITY.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... The Met's Pension Fund benefit gala on May 11 turned out to be something more than just the latest stop for the Three Tenors traveling circus, despite the casting of Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras in, respectively, Act III...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: SAN DIEGO.(Brief Article)
August 1, 2000... From the time of its first performance at San Francisco Opera (Sept. 1998), Andre Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire had been slated as an important part of San Diego Opera's 1999-2000 season. But would there be cast changes? Many people...

FROM AROUND THE WORLD: DETROIT.
August 1, 2000... It was Der Rosenkavalier en famille when Michigan Opera Theatre presented Richard Strauss's bittersweet romantic fable last spring -- in heavily truncated form -- with Helen Donath as the Marschallin; husband, Klaus, conducting; and son,...

OBITUARIES.(Brief Article)(Obituary)
August 1, 2000... CESARE VALLETTI Rome, December 18, 1922 -- Genoa, May 13, 2000 The distinguished Italian lyric tenor made his stage debut in Bari in 1947 in La Traviata. In Rome in 1950 he appeared in Rossini's Il Turco in Italia with Maria Callas and...