Tag Archives: mozart

Like the 504 streetcar

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Season announcements, it seems, are like the King Street streetcar(1).  You wait for ages then three come along at once.  This time it’s Opera Atelier announcing the 2017/18 season.  As ever there are two productions.  A remount of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro runs October 26th to November 4th. The cast icludes Douglas Williams, making his Opera Atelier debut, in the title role, with Mireille Asselin (Susanna), Stephen Hegedus (Count Almaviva), Peggy Kriha Dye (Countess Almaviva), Mireille Lebel (Cherubino), Laura Pudwell (Marcellina), Gustav Andreassen (Bartolo), Christopher Enns (Basilio/Don Curzio), Olivier Laquerre (Antonio), and Grace Lee (Barbarina).  This one will be sung in English.

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Patrick Jang, Carla Huhtanen and Phillip Addis in “The Marriage of Figaro” (2010).  Photo by Bruce Zinger.

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Magic Flute revived at COC

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Last night saw the first performance of this season’s run of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte at the COC.  It’s a revival of the Diane Paulus 2011 production with Ashlie Corcoran as revival director.  It has a “theatre within a theatre” overlay in Act 1; it’s supposed to be an aristocratic birthday party for Pamina where the guests perform the opera, which mysteriously disappears in Act 2 though it makes an odd reprise right at the end where all the characters appear to perform a country dance.  Strip that element out and it’s a workmanlike Flute with nothing much to say but some pretty visuals.  The animals are cute and the trials scene is rather well done.  There is one notable change from 2011.  Pamina’s lurid pink Disney princess outfit is gone, replaced by something Regencyish and far less jarring.

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COC 2017/18

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Last night the Canadian Opera Company announced the line up for the 2017/18 season.  It was all pretty much as predicted.  My predictions post got five out of six right and Dylan was right on the money down to timing.  So what do we get?

The fall season features, finally, Tim Albery’s production of Strauss’ Arabella first seen at Santa Fe.  Erin Wall, as expected, takes the title role while Jane Archibald, in one of three season appearances, sings Zdenka.  The Mandryka will be one of the few high profile imports, Tomasz Konieczny.  There are welcome appearances for David Pomery as Matteo and Claire de Sevigné as Flakermilli.  It’s a season full of Ensemble Studio graduates.  Patrick Lange conducts.  Partnering Arabella is Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore in a production by James Robinson adapted to set the piece in pre WW1 Niagara on the Lake.  Simone Osborne and Andrew Haji play Adina and Nemorino with Gordon Bintner as Belcore.  This is, I think, the first time I’ve seen husband and wife as soloists at the COC though the Pomeroys have been seen on stage together quite a few times.  Brit Andrew Shore rounds things out as Dulcemara.  Yves Abel makes his COC debut in the pit.

arabella

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Divine Karina

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divine karinaThis review first appeared in the print edition of Opera Canada.

Divine Karina is a compilation of tracks from previously released Gauvin records on the ATMA Classiques label. There’s Purcell, plenty of Handel, Bach and other baroque composers with ventures into Mozart, Mahler and even Britten. Accompaniment is, mostly, by an assortment of Quebec period bands though the Orchestre Métropolitain with Nézet-Séguin put in an appearance for the Sehr behaglich from Mahler’s Fourth. There’s a previously unreleased track as a bonus; a duet with her Las Vegas based sister in a sort of lounge jazz style.

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Mozart 225

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mozart225Today marks the 225th anniversary of Mozart’s death.  To commemorate it Universal Records (Deutsche Grammophon and Decca basically) have put together a special commemorative edition which I have had a chance to dip into, but not much more than dip into, because it is huge.  It’s a cuboid about the size of an LP record and a little over half as deep.  It weighs 10kg.  Inside are 200 CDs containing the complete works of Mozart including juvenalia, fragments, arrangements and alternative versions.  There’s also a copy of the latest Kerchel catalogue, some prints and two very handsome hardback books; a new biography by Cliff Eisen and a second volume containing essays and work by work commentary.  What there isn’t is libretti for the vocal works but it actually gets better.  One can go to the website mozart225.com and download an app, offered in a choice of languages, with the libretti of all the works plus translation.  (You do need the code from the set to do this).  OK so I’m a bit of a gadget freak but all the Mozart libretti on my phone?  How cool is that?

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All the Mozart

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dg0743902Deutsche Grammophon have re-released the Mozart M22 recordings in a new edition.  It contains all the operas, singspiels and other bits and pieces mostly recorded at Salzburg in 2006.  The whole thing comes to 33 DVDs recorded in HD and with 5.1 surround sound.  It’s also incredibly cheap.  Amazon.ca has it listed at C$139.99 including shipping.  Full details are available on the Presto Classical site which is likely a good source for UK buyers but others might want to watch the postage charges on this one!  The set includes some fine productions including Kušej’s Don Giovanni and La clemenza di Tito and Guth’s Le nozze di Figaro.  It’s also still currently the only way of getting hold of Herheim’s notorious Die Entführung aus dem Serail which has been out of the catalogue for ages and still isn’t available separately.  The only drawbacks I can see are that many collectors will already have many of these discs and it’s only available on DVD rather than Blu-ray (but most of these recordings never did make it to Blu-ray).  It would make a great Christmas present for someone starting an opera DVD collection.

UoT Opera season opener

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As has become the norm, UoT Opera opened their concert season with a free “preview” of their spring show in the RBA at noon today.  It was a series of Mozart scenes which were given semi-staged today but will, in the fullness of time, form a staged and costumed performance.  It’s always an interesting event because it’s so early in the academic year.  It’s the first chance to try and talent spot and see how things develop over the rest of the cycle.  As such, it’s often a bit rough but today really wasn’t.  It was a surprisingly high quality across the board effort which augurs well.  That said, it was all ensembles and nobody was asked to pull out vocal fireworks so maybe not the sternest test imaginable which makes star picking that bit trickier.

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Next week

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nathaliepaulin_365sq.jpgThe Mazzoleni Songmasters series opens this afternoon at 2pm in, surprise, Mazzoleni Hall at the conservatory.  Nathalie Paulin and Monica Whicher present Welcome and Adieu; a program of English and French songs and duets.  Collaborative pianists are Robert Kortgaard and Peter Tiefenbach.

Tuesday at noon in the RBA sees the students of UoT Opera present an all Mozart program. It’s semi staged and the program is duets and ensemble numbers so not your usual fare.  Free of course but probably one one will need to arrive early for.

Norma and Ariodante continue at the COC as does Dido and Aeneas at Opera Atelier.

 

UoT 2016/17

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UoT Faculty of Music have just announced their 2016/17 season.  It’s the usual broad range of performances so I’ll highlight the opera and vocal music contributions.

UoT Opera is offering four shows.  The fall main production is Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld with new English dialogue and stage direction by Michael Patrick Albano.  Choreography i by Anna Theodosakis and Russell Braun makes his podium debut.  There are four performances November 24th to 27th.  Spring sees a Handel rarity; Imeneo.  Tim Albery directs and Daniel Taylor is in charge of the music.  This one runs March 16th to 19th.  Both shows are in the MacMillan Theatre.

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Last year’s student composed opera; The Machine Stops

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Coming up at COC?

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A co-production between the COC and Opéra de Lyon has just opened in France.  It’s Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail with rewritten dialogues by Lebanese-Canadian-French playwright Wajdi Mouawad, who also directs. It can be watched online here.  It’s geoblocked but you can use something like Tunnel Bear to watch it.  There’s a very complete analysis of the production by Lydia Perovic over on her blog.

seraglio lyon

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