The two 200th-birthday boys of 2013, Richard Wagner and Giuseppe Verdi, have been staples of the world’s opera houses since middle of the 19th century, and nothing’s changed today. Each of the three area opera companies will feature work by Verdi in the 2013-14 season, and one of them will offer Wagner: Sarasota Opera is mounting The Flying Dutchman. Florida Grand Opera, under … [Read more...]
Broward Stage Door cast does well with disturbing ‘Twilight of the Golds’
By Dale King The morality drama The Twilight of the Golds asks a question that some might not want to answer: If parents knew their child would be born gay, would they allow the birth or choose abortion? Broward Stage Door Theatre in Coral Springs takes a bold step by opening the 2013-14 season for Theatre II with this taut and tense tragicomedy, which demands responses to … [Read more...]
Opera on the Road: An astonishing rarity at Bard Summerscape
Forget Kirov, forget Bolshoi: We may one day have our own Russian opera company in New York state. Bard Summerscape, now in its 10th year delivered a magnificent performance of Sergey Taneyev’s Oresteia, premiered in 1895, which I saw on Aug. 4. The Annandale-on-Hudson festival is fast becoming a rival to Wagner’s Bayreuth as the place to be. Production values are very … [Read more...]
PB Opera gives us a ‘Salome’ with a conscience
Richard Strauss’ Salome has earned its reputation for decadence not just because of its Oscar Wilde source, the time of its composition in the overripe-civilization years of the early 20th century, or its score, with its strange, unexpected sounds at every turn. It has also earned it because of the story itself, which ends in a parody of Wagnerian bliss, with a cruel but … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2012-13: A season of change for local opera
After years of retrenchment and cutbacks, the area’s opera companies are moving ahead in positive directions in the coming season. Although both South Florida companies haven’t added back the productions they once cut, there are signs of a return to artistic daring, and the Sarasota company is offering a world premiere of an American opera. And the popular high-definition … [Read more...]
Palm Beach Opera’s Aprea leaves company; Fleisher gives Lynn master class
WEST PALM BEACH – The artistic director of the Palm Beach Opera has left the company, officials said Tuesday. Bruno Aprea, who has led musical aspects of the company’s productions and orchestral concerts since 2005, rejected the contract he was offered for the new season, said the company’s general director, Daniel Biaggi. The company has been restructuring to a more … [Read more...]
FGO names Sarasota Opera’s Danis as its new CEO
MIAMI ― A new general director and chief executive officer will lead the Florida Grand Opera in the 2012-13 season. Susan T. Danis joins the Florida Grand Opera on Oct. 9. Danis is the fourth general director and CEO in the opera’s 72-year-history. Robert Heuer, the company’s CEO for 32 years, retired in May. A self-proclaimed “opera geek,” Danis spent almost 14 years … [Read more...]
Opera at Bard: ‘King’ plot preposterous, but Chabrier’s opera worth doing
ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y. -- “This is a royal mess,’’ sings one of the characters in Bard Summerscape’s performance of Emmanuel Chabrier’s comic opera Le Roi Malgré Lui (The King In Spite of Himself). This could well be a wry reflection on the quality of the singing or the production. It is not. Standards were very high. Rather, it goes to the root of why this opera is not … [Read more...]
Opera’s Szot scratches Broadway itch in Royal Room engagement
The Colony Hotel’s Royal Room has presented some enchanted evenings in its ten years as a cabaret venue, but probably never more so than with its current showcase of Paulo Szot, the Tony Award-winning star of the 2008 revival of South Pacific. An opera singer by training and profession, Szot long harbored a desire to appear in a Broadway musical. “I never tried, but it was a … [Read more...]
PB Opera cancels vocal contest to boost Young Artists program; Muse Award winners named
Palm Beach Opera said last week it is expanding its Young Artist program to add more singers, three days of auditions in New York, and a staged production next season featuring the young musicians. In order to put the expansion into effect, the West Palm Beach-based opera company has canceled this year’s vocal competition, which had been scheduled for April. “We realized … [Read more...]