A sparkling production of Johann Strauss the Younger‘s Die Fledermaus by the Academy of the Paris Opera is being performed at the MC 93 theater in the Paris suburb of Bobigny before touring four French cities. With a terrific cast … Read More
Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin, currently on stage at the Bastille Opera, is an extraordinary thing. Written in 1850, when the composer was still in his 30s, it marks the end of what one might call the trio of his youthful operas … Read More
I must admit to a longstanding prejudice against the music of Giacomo Puccini. For me, the music and action of an opera should form a cohesive whole, but in Puccini’s case, the melodies are too frothily beautiful for their own … Read More
Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, which has just opened at the Bastille Opera House in Paris in a production shared with the Salzburg Festival, feels like a regression in so many ways. After the visceral violence of Strauss’s first two operas, … Read More
Weirdly Wonderful OperaBooed on Opening Night La Damnation de Faust. Photo © Felipe Sanguinetti Hector Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust, a weirdly wonderful work labeled a “dramatic legend” rather than an opera by the composer, seems better suited to the 21st … Read More
Breaking Out ofThe Operatic Comfort Zone A Charolais bull plays the golden calf in Moses und Aron. Photo © Bernd Uhlig If the slogan currently emblazoned across the huge facade of the Bastille Opera House – “Verdi or Schoenberg, why … Read More
On first encounter, Richard Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg would seem to be an early work. Not only is it a comedy, completely at odds with the supernatural themes that pervade his later operas, but it contains all the elements … Read More
Fine Cast and OrchestraCarry Revived Production The orchestra onstage. Photo © Julien Benhamou It can sometimes be instructive to revisit an operatic production viewed previously, and I was glad to have the chance to see the return of Olivier Py’s … Read More
Grand Themes,Intimate Singing Court scene. Photo © Agathe Poupeney. The appearance of Pierre Corneille’s play Le Cid in 1637 had a long-lasting effect on French cultural life. Not only did its subject matter – the young hero Rodrigue is forced to … Read More
