Docu-#MiloRau overlays #FlyingDutchman @deutsche_oper w 🇩🇪 guilt & 🇮🇱 suffering in Tour de force through 🇩🇪+🇮🇱 history, 🎥 playing #Wagner in Jerusalem, witnesses—more allegory than opera. Worked in its way! @tomkonieczny goes along, #DerekWelton jumped in 2nd part. Senta so-so.
Strange&problematic half breed of opera, melodrama, straight play, vaudeville&jazz: #Zemlinsky’s last opera #DerKreidekreis @operamrhein now too in #Duisburg. #DavidBösch avoids 🇨🇳 “exotic”& paints portray of 👩 treated as commodity but yet standing up against🧔♂️. Vindication!
.@theaterRGNSBRG hit it w #KrólRoger strong season opener! #Szymanowski’s unique meandering harmonic joins #SebastianRitschel’s prod posing questions of freedom&dependence in falling apart society. Great #MartinEngerHolm as dionysian disrupter, #CarlRumstadt as self-confronted 🤴
#Handel’s #Ottone @operfrankfurt substitutes political power struggles w decadent 18c huis clos playing charade in #JetskeMijnssen’s prod. Great eve 4 2 counter tenors @YuriyMinenko #IuriiIushkevich as rivals, #PaulaMurrihy shines as string-puller.
No redemption 4 redeemer&Amfortas’s wound as live-giving 4 grail guys (latter seen often, but still nonsense). Mixed bag gray dystopian #Parsifal #EvgenyTitov @rbo_org w smooth #StanislasDeBarbeyrac & #ChristianGerhaher as nuanced Wagner singer. #JakubHrůša not stuck in adulation
#CherryTown, or “Moscow, Cheryomushki” operetta by #DmitriShostakovich @DutchNatOpera abt housing problems cuts all dialogues, sings 🇬🇧 , adds breakdancers & leaves story unclear. @jakobahlbom uses surrealism instead of sharp satire. But cast on 🔥 & singers mostly adequate.
Typical #ChristofLoy #PelléasEtMélisande #Prague National Theatre: Understated yet profoundly stirring; cleanlines&psychological precision. Landscapes open in suffocating space&M finally escapes. La vérité, la vérité! 🇮🇸 #ArnheiðurEiríksdótti luminous&vulnerable. 🔝 cast, clear🎶
#Salieri‘s #Tarare absolutely worth the rediscovery @OperaRoyal! Seamless 🎶, grand effects & a whiff of 🇫🇷 revolution. No surprise, #Beaumarchais librettist—and a descendant of his spoke on opening night. @ReinoudVMTenor ideal voice 4 title role. @theotimeviolin w drive&elegance
Navigating through protests 2 #Götterdämmerung @operadeparis as @Calixto_Bieito’s last part of new “Data is the new gold”-#Ring. Siegfried goes Business world but is not smart enough. Astonishingly minimalist ending. The 💍 is all that’s left. #TamaraWilson 🔝. @herascasado light
Psycho double-bill @WrStaatsoper #FlorentineTragedy & #BluebeardsCastle w #AsmikGrigorian stunningly navigating these complex inner worlds. #VasilyBarkhatov links #Zemlinsky & #Bartók by treating Bluebeard’s 7 doors as shared, unhealed trauma. A pairing that works!
It’s done! #OperKöln 1st prod after 14 yrs renovation #Rosenkavalier by #MarieÈveSigneyrole sets it in 🎥 business, as seen so often. Forced&sometimes confusing. Orch under #AndrésOrozcoEstrada too overwhelming. But great versatile #BiancaAndrew role debut Octavian! Ochs as MeToo
#Stockhausen is dead! At least in this prod by #SusanneKennedy @deutsche_oper. Cutesy-pootsie meets shallow private religion in static ritualistic setting w oldest New Music ever. AI generated 🎥 overload & 🚁 quartet don’t cut it. @secherletemps & @Le_Balcon ambitious Synth.
#Reimann’s #Lear in @BarrieKosky’s version is middle-aged CEO who loses it, literally. Masterfully intense, sometimes gross, Personenregie in vast Tempelhof hangar, w #ScottHendricks outstanding in title role, though mics required 4 all. #NicholasCarter unleashed ⚡️ sound wall.
Grand scale (as usual) #AnselmKiefer at Palazzo Reale #Milan. Women Alchemists, neglected and resurrected by Kiefer in stark, tangible formats. Optimal space for this exhibit with its shabby charm. Probably sole opportunity to see it in this configuration and completeness.
No hope, nowhere: #Tchaikovsky’s dismal #Mazeppa @operfrankfurt in Erl production by #MatthewWild still stringent in its handling of singers&chorus (big time!). No folklore but thugs fighting over 👩. #PetrSokolov in title role smoldering terror. #KarstenJanuschke sovereign 🎶
Restraint #Macbeth @staatsoperHH leaving cruelty as imaginary tale, watched by kind of Greek chorus, not 🧙. #TobiasKratzer gives the Macbeths a family, but let them lose control 2 higher forces. #TomášHanus conducts w colorful intensity. @Nino_Machaidze adequate Lady role debut.
Male Sops are hot! The Sopranos #BayreuthBaroque w thoughtful programming w/o usual Baroque showstoppers. And pur ti miro for 3 Sops as encore! @MaayanLicht #DennisOrellana & #FedericoFiorio rocked the Markgräfliches. Left one wishing for more.
Dark #Handel #Floridante #BayreuthBaroque w #MaxEmanuelCencic in title role & director. Stunning laments & musically it has not to shy away from his more popular operas. #MarkellosChryssicos conducts flexible, funny in the recits 🎶 w Wrocław Baroque Orchestra. Perfect cast 👏
A historic event: #Cesti‘s #IlPomoDOro #InnsbruckerFestwochen complete 6 hours bliss over 2 days w partly reconstructed 🎶, @AccademiaBizant #OttavioDantone evoked colorful spectacle worthy of festival’s anniversary. #FabioCeresa staged btw Baroque splendor&contemporary struggle
50th Innsbrucker Festwochen ambitious project of staging #Cesti‘s complete #IlPomoDOro on two nights w reconstructed music for acts III and V. #OttavioDantone and @AccademiaBizant half way through tonight. More tomorrow.
