Tag Archives: radvanovsky

Heading towards May

Posted on by
Reply

0337b61a1abb24ac_Paschera_M3F4155medres.previewHere are a couple more upcoming events that readers may be interested in.  The Royal Conservatory has a festival of contemporary music from April 21st to May 25th.  There are eight concerts in a variety of genres.  The most interesting to me is on May 22nd when there is a concert to celebrate R. Murray Schafer’s 80th birthday.  The concert will feature four pieces; Quintet for Piano and Strings Shafer himself, played by the ARC Ensemble; a world premiere of The Questioning by Canadian composer Christos Hatzis, written for and played by the Afiara String Quartet, Faster Still, a work by the by Canadian composer Brian Current played by the ARC Ensemble; and the Canadian premiere of Dutch composer Louis Andriessen’s Anaïs Nin, a semi-staged work for chamber ensemble, video, and mezzo-soprano, based on the diary entries of Anaïs Nin. Singing the role of Anaïs Nin will be a favourite of mine, Wallis Giunta most recently seen in the COC’s Così fan tutte.  More details and tickets available here.

On May 1st at 1pm 96.3 FM are broadcasting Sondra Radvanovsky in recital live from the Zoomerplex.  You can catch it on the radio or at www.classical963fm.com. There’s also a draw for free tickets for the recital and the reception before.  I believe to enter you need to email name, phone number and email address to classical963fm1031@gmail.com.

Toronto Summer Music Festival

Posted on by
Reply

Toronto Summer Music will run from July 22 to August 12. There’s a wide variety of programming but the highlights for opera and song fans are as follows:

Sondra Radvanovsky is in concert on Thursday, July 31 at 7:30 p.m. at Koerner Hall. The programme is “favourite Italian opera arias”.. Whether it’s orchestral or piano accompaniment I don’t know.

Christopher Maltman accompanied by Graham Johnson will be at Walter Hall on Wednesday, August 6 at 7:30 p.m.with a programme titled The Soldier:  From Severn to Somme which will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the First World War. It will include songs by Mahler, Mussorgsky, Butterworth, Ives, Finzi and Poulenc.

On Thursday, August 7 at 7:30 p.m. at Walter Hall, Peter McGillivray and pianist David Louie will join TSO principals Jonathan Crow and Etsuko Kimura (violin), Eric Nowlin (viola), David Hetherington (cello) and Yao Guang Zhai (clarinet) to perform a Viennese programme featuring Mahler’s Songs of a Wayfarer and Waltzes by Strauss, all in arrangements by Schoenberg and Berg.

The annual TSM Academy Art of Song Recitals will take place on Friday, August 8th (my birthday, send cake) at 12:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. at Walter Hall. These are the showcase recitals for the 12 young singers who were awarded TSM Academy scholarships and who will have prepared with French baritone François Le Roux and pianist Graham Johnson. Naturally, no programming has yet been announced.

Festival, Weekly and Flex passes ($202 -$592) are on sale as of April 3, 2014. Individual concert tickets ($20 to $99) will be on sale as of April 17, 2014. To purchase festival passes and single tickets visit www.torontosummermusic.com , call 416-408-0208 or visit the Weston Family Box Office at the Royal Conservatory of Music.

Straightforward but effective Il Trovatore

Posted on by
1

Verdi’s Il Trovatore really is a peculiar piece.  It’s a bit of a musical hybrid with huge, rousing choruses interspersed with bel canto arias which I suppose is fairly typical of middle period Verdi.  It has a truly silly plot (perhaps based on Blackadder’s lost novel) with gypsies, dead babies and  improbable coincidences galore.  It’s also notoriously hard to cast with five very demanding roles combining a need for flawless bel canto technique with lots of power.  David McVicar’s production at the Metropolitan Opera was broadcast in HD in April 2011 and subsequently released on Blu-ray and DVD.  I saw the HD broadcast and enjoyed it enough to buy the Blu-ray.

1.legend Continue reading →

‘Tis the season to speculate

Posted on by
10

Finley-Gerald-02With a month or so to go before the Canadian Opera Company officially announces its 2013/14 season it’s surely time for some uninformed speculation.

There are three big anniversaries in 2013; the bicentenaries of Verdi and Wagner and the centenary of Benjamin Britten.  One would think all would be represented but maybe not.  We know Verdi will be.  Gerald Finley announced at the Rubies that he would make his role debut in the title role in Falstaff at COC in 2013/14 so we can ink that one in.  Britten seems probable.  There’s a Houston/COC co-pro of Peter Grimes, directed by Neil Armfield that is due to to come to Toronto.  I think we can pencil that one in.  No idea on casting but I would love to see Stuart Skelton myself.  Wagner, I’m not so sure.  Maybe February’s run of Tristan und Isolde will be COC’s sole nod to Wagner.  Certainly the next most likely candidate; the Lyon/Met/COC Parsifal is, apparently, not expected before 2015.

Continue reading →

Una opera in maschera

Posted on by
6

I despair.  I really do.  Yesterday’s MetHD broadcast of Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera had so much going for it.  The singing was brilliant and David Alden’s production seemed to have plenty of interesting ideas.  I say “seemed” because we only got the briefest of brief glimpses of it in between the succession of close ups served up by video director Matthew Diamond.  On the odd occasions we got to see more than a head or a body it was usually from a weird angle.  It’s particularly irritating because the two elements of the production that seemed to be most important were the ones most ruthlessly undermined.  Alden’s movement of chorus, supers and dancers and the contrast between what they do and what the principals do seems to be important but who knows?  Similarly his use of contrasting spaces, especially in Act 3, is obviously important but when the viewer gets only a couple of seconds to establish the context before the camera moves in and loses it the effect is fatally weakened.

ballo Continue reading →

Alfano’s Cyrano with Domingo and Radvanovsky

Posted on by
5

It’s hard to think of a play that would make a better basis for an opera libretto than Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac.  Henri Cain’s adaptation is rather good; somewhat simplifying and tightening up the plot in a similar manner to that later taken by Britten and Pears with A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It’s a shame Franco Alfano’s music doesn’t really rise to the same heights.  It has its moments, especially later in the opera, but much of the time it’s dull and impressionistic; more like a film soundtrack than an opera score.  I guess the lesson is that one just can’t do verismo while trying to avoid vulgarity and excessive melodrama.  It also has to be said that much of the time the music seems to be fighting the natural rhythm of the words rather than supporting it.  What the music does have is Alfano’s trademark torturing of his singers, especially the principal four roles of Cyrano, Roxane, Christian and De Guiche.

Continue reading →

Il Trovatore

Posted on by
1

Il Trovatore has gypsies, burning at the stake, dead babies, mistaken identity, poison, love, hate, revenge and enough plot holes to sink the Titanic. It also has some very effective dramatic moments and some utterly fabulous music. The biggest snag is probably that the utterly fantastic music needs a quartet of soloists who can deal with fiendishly difficult parts that require a combination of flawless bel canto technique coupled to Puccinian power and stamina. The power and stamina requirement being especially high in a barn like the Met. It also has a dramatical problem in that it consists if a sequence of fairly short scenes which means a production runs the risk of being chopped up by the changes of set.

Continue reading →