Throughout the history of Italian opera the long running feud between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines has provided composers and librettists with endless opportunities for pointless revenge killings and other assorted mayhem. They werer still doing it in 1907 when Frencesco Cilea premiered his short three act opera Gloria.
I first came across Russian soprano Ekaterina Siurina as Zerlina in the 2008 video recording of Mozart’s Don Giovanni from Salzburg. She had had plenty of success already in coloratura roles such as Gilda and Adina and was, I thought, the best Zerlina I had come across. Fast forward to 2015 and she sang a very fine Violetta at the Four Seasons Centre opposite her husband Charles Castronovo. A few years on and it’s not terribly surprising that she’s starting to venture into slightly heavier lyric-dramatic territory. This is reflected in her recent album Where is My Beloved? recorded in 2022 with the Kaunas Symphony Orchestra conducted by Constantin Orbelian. Continue reading
My review of Opera in Concert’s streamed version of Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur is now up at Opera Canada.
VOICEBOX:Opera in Concert have a streamed version of Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur premiering on Friday. It’s a film made at the Edward Jackman Centre that reimagines the opera as a game of chess. Natalya Gennadi sings the title role with Julie Nesrallah as the Princess de Bouillon. The cast also includes Holly Chaplin and Evan Korbut. Tickets are $20 from www.operainconcert.com and the stream will be available until July 2nd.
The line up for Voicebox: Opera in Concert has been announced for the 2019/20 season. There are four shows:
All shows are at the Jane Mallett Theatre.
Apparently the Amazonas Festival is on this year which means a chance to see opera in the perhaps the world’s most unlikely opera house, the Teatro Amazonas in Manaus, 1000 miles up the Amazon. Iain Scott of IS Opera Tours is looking to organise a trip, if there is enough interest, to see Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur in Manaus on the evening of Friday 27th May with a couple of days sightseeing either side. Basically the deal is that you get yourself to Manaus and Iain organises accommodation, sightseeing, opera tickets etc. Anyone up for an unusual opera adventure should contact Iain for more details at iainscott@opera-is.com.
So, Sondra made a live broadcast for 96.3 FM at lunchtime today. It was one of those media things where the audience was aggressively stage managed by the floor staff but otherwise quite enjoyable. Also there was lunch which was a definite plus. What was a bit annoying was the overall vibe of “fitting opera into the programming for old folks”. Way to build a new audience there!
The performance was varied and interesting with Sondra on good form and the ever reliable Rachel Andrist on piano. There was no printed progrmme or lyric sheets so I’m going from my hastily scribbled notes but we got some Rachmaninov songs, which suited Sondra really well plus arias from Trovatore, Norma, Tosca and Andrea Chenier plus a Verdi song, Copland’s Simple Gifts and I could have danced all night. Nothing if not varied! It’s interesting how dropping from big opera rep to something like the Copland can be astonishingly effective. Simplicity and lack of artifice has it’s charms. And, yes, I want to hear her Norma and, if rumour is half way correct, probably will in the not too distant future.
Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur isn’t performed very often and, when it is, it’s usually because some great diva of the day wants to do it. That’s the case with the 2010 Covent Garden production which was created by David McVicar for Angela Gheorghiu. Actually I am a bit surprised it’s not done more often. It’s not a great masterpiece but it’s no worse than a great many commonly done pieces and, if the plot is a bit implausible, it’s not as offensive as half of Puccini’s output. I would have thought it would have great appeal to that opera middle ground to which I don’t belong.
operaramblings 