Tag Archives: out opera

Next week…

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440x360_normaHere’s a preview of things to see/listen to next week.  It’s Met in HD season again and the next two Saturdays have broadcasts.  On the 7th it’s Bellini’s Norma with Sondra Radvanovsky and Joyce DiDonato.  It’s a David McVicar production and no prizes for guessing what happens when you cross McVicar and druids.  On the 14th it’s Die Zauberflöte with the Resident Groundhog conducting.  It’s the Julie Taymor production but given in full in German rather than the abridged ‘for kids” version.  The best thing about the cast is René Pape’s Sarastro.

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Postcard from Morocco

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Dominick Argento’s 1971 work Postcard from Morocco is unusual.  It’s opera meets Ionesco meets acid rock.  It’s a weird and wonderful kaleidoscope of scenes and music “about” a group of characters who seem to have nothing in common except that they have showed up at a railway station in Morocco c. 1914.  Michael Cavanagh’s production for UoT Opera plays it straight veering to OTT which seems about right.  This piece doesn’t need directorial “interpretation” but it does need careful organisation and lots of energy.  Cavanagh’s approach provided plenty of both.

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In like a lion

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7796132196_c04e8013c3_zGood heavens it’s March already!  There’s lots coming up in the Toronto vocal music scene.  This Saturday sees George Benjamin’s Written on Skin in concert performance with the TSO at Roy Thomson Hall.  Chris Purves and Barbara Hannigan from the original cast are singing with Bernhard Landauer coming in for Bejun Mehta as the Boy.  The composer conducts.

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