October 29, 2010
English Touring Opera presents Goehr’s “Promised End”
Promised End
Taking on King Lear is no small matter. Not simply because it was written by Shakespeare—what could be more daunting?—but also because the play...
Jaime Robles
September 26, 2010
LA Opera’s “Il Postino”
LA Opera's artful new opera
The floor of the open stage of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion is covered with blue and white decorative tile, reminiscent of Italian ceramic work, and, upstage, a small movable terrazzo seems to float on air like a balcony overlooking the sea. As the lighting shifts and alters, the tiles transform, seeming...
September 16, 2010
San Francisco Opera’s ‘Aida’
Opera is a many-splendoured thing
What’s cyan blue and gold and spectacular all over?
Why, the San Francisco Opera’s new production of Verdi’s “Aida” (developed in concert with the English National Opera and Houston Grand Opera), which opened September 10 at the War Memorial Opera House and continues through December 5.
This venerable pillar of 19th-century values...
September 15, 2010
San Francisco Opera’s ‘Werther’
Between the sorrows of love ...
Within the series of letters that make up Goethe’s “The Sorrows of Young Werther” many of the emotions and aesthetics later characteristic of 19th-century Romanticism flow and ebb amid the writer’s youthful enthusiasms. These letters addressed to Werther’s friend, Wilhelm, tell of his brief and unhappy love for a woman who marries another man, his despair and his...
August 1, 2010
Preview of Merola’s “L’elisir d’amore”
A model opera training program
It’s well known that many of today’s world-class singers have passed through San Francisco’s Merola Program, a...
July 23, 2010
Preview of Music@Menlo
Summer nights filled with music
There is very little more soothing to the heart and mind than filling soft summer nights with music. And there is little more appealing music than chamber music, with its kaleidoscopic variety and...