Opera Review: The Play is Not the Thing

Opera Lafayette returns to New York with Radamisto.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Married life: Zenobia (Hagar Sharvit) and Radamisto (Caitlin Hulcup) are on the run in Radamisto.
Photo by Louis Forget © 2019 Opera Lafayette.

The world of opera was very different in 1720. That's the first take-away from Radamisto, the Handel opera that made a rare stage appearance on Thursday night at the Kaye Playhouse. The performance was a visit from Opera Lafayette, the intrepid Washington D.C. company that specializes in reviving stage works from the 18th century. This was their first excursion into Handel, and it was generally a success.

Opera Review: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Handel's Atalanta bows at Caramoor. 
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra with Nicholas McGegan at its center.
Photo by Suzanne Karp.

When an arts festival goes through a major change of direction, there are always bumps and bruises. At Caramoor, which has operated on the Rosen estate in Katona New York for seventy-three years, those bruises are starting to show. There is a new artistic administrator on the campus: Kathy Schuman, formerly of Carnegie Hall. Gathering places and social areas are being renovated. And the festival's crown jewel, its opera series, has undergone the most rigorous change of all.

Opera Review: What We Got Here is a Crusader

The English Concert performs Rinaldo.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Going for baroque: Iestyn Davies (center) sings the title role in Rinaldo as Harry Bicket (seated, left) conducts.
Photo by Chris Lee © 2018 Carnegie Hall.

In the already esoteric world of opera performance, staging the operas of George Frederic Handel takes the anachronism to the next level. At Carnegie Hall on Sunday, conductor Harry Bicket led The English Concert in the latest of their wildly successful series of Handel operas and oratorios in concert. The latest: Rinaldo, the opera that made Handel's name in London, the city that would become that well-traveled composer's permanent home base.

The Mysteries of the High Baroque

Or we could call it: “Getting a Grip on Handel” but then even less people would take it seriously.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Big mssn in s big wig: the composer George Frideric Handel.

As is the case with many of the good things in life, I came to Handel late.

Oh sure, I knew who he was. German guy who lived in England. Wore a wig. Wrote the album of flute concertos I cherished as a kid--judt about the only classical cassette I had before I turned 16. I had even visited his grave in Westminster Abbey when I was maybe 14. I was impressed!Here was the grave of a real composer, a famous one. But he remained an enigma. He had written Messiah and he was famous for that. But when I grew up, we didn't go to Messiah at Christmas and it had never occurred to my parents to take me. We sang "Hallelujah!" at Easter. Sometimes.

Opera Review: Winged Mercury, Orbiting Venus

Joyce DiDonato sings Ariodante at Carnegie Hall.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Joyce DiDonato sings "Scherza infida" in Act II of Handel's Ariodante
with Harry Bicket (seated at keyboard) at Carnegie Hall. Image © 2017 Medici.tv.

Joyce Di Donato has had a mercurial rise in this decade. The Kansas City mezzo-soprano is equally at home in bel canto and the high baroque, coupling her talent with a friendly yet regal demeanor that makes her in demand around the world. On Sunday afternoon, Ms. DiDonato joined Harry Bicket and The English Concert for Ariodante at Carnegie Hall, singing the title role as part of her residency at that august institution. The entire performance was broadcast live on Medici.TV.

Concert Review: Her Terrible, Swift Sword

Juditha Triumphans triumphs at Carnegie Hall.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Judith and Holofernes by Valentin de Bolougne. 

National Museum of Fine Arts, Valletta, Malta

The music of Antonio Vivaldi was forgotten for centuries. When he was rediscovered in the 20th century, he rapidly emerged as one of the greatest composers of Renaissance Venice. The father of the multi-movement violin concerto, he was also a teacher of music, the creator of 94 operas and (at least) four oratorios. On Tuesday night, Carnegie Hall resounded with its first performance of his lone surviving oratorio, Juditha Triumphans.

Concert Review: A Warrior For Her Art

Joyce DiDonato sings of war and peace.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Joyce DiDonato sings of war and peace at Carnegie Hall, with dancer Manuel Palazzo (right.)
Photo by Chris Lee © 2016 courtesy Carnegie Hall press department.

The Carnegie Hall Perspectives series provides artists with a blank slate, a freedom to mount dream projects upon the hallowed boards of the Perelman Stage. On Thursday night, it was Joyce DiDonato's turn. The mezzo-soprano offered In War & Peace, a program of baroque arias with period ensemble Il Pomo D'Oro. To it, she added back projections, rock concert lighting and interpretive dance, all elements as foreign to this staid environment as the cutting ring of a cell phone.

Opera Review: Fireworks Over Jerusalem

A concert Rinaldo strikes sparks at the Kaufman Center
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Armida falls in love with Rinaldo. Rinaldo and Armida, painting by Nicolas Poussin 1629

The 39 operas written by Georg Friederich Handel are a trove of great music that has only recently been explored by modern listeners. It is the ambition of conductor and harpsichordist Jennifer Peterson and her company operamission to correct that. Last week, at the Merkin Concert Hall, operamission presented their most ambitious show yet. This was a concert performance of Handel's fourth opera Rinaldo with a period instrument orchestra and an impressive cast. The work was presented complete and in concert, with the audience supplied with xeroxed librettos and plot summaries of the extensive recitatives.

Opera Review: Those Pesky Invisible Pirates

American Classical Orchestra mounts Haydn's L'Isola disabitata.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The cast share a tender moment in a scene from L'isola disabitata.
Photo © 2015 American Classical Orchestra.

Unlike his symphonies and string quartets, the thirteen operas written by Franz Josef Haydn have gotten comparatively short shrift. On Tuesday night, the American Classical Orchestra under the leadership of Thomas Crawford made an effort to correct that oversight with a performance of  L'Isola disabitata, Haydn's tenth opera. This rarely staged work dates from 1779.

Opera Review: Wrestling with the Gods

The Canadian Opera Company presents Semele at BAM.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Temple maiden: Semele (Jane Archibald) awaits her lover in the Handel opera.
Photo provided by Brooklyn Academy of Music © 2015 Canadian Opera Company.

The rich history of China is a recurring leitmotif in the 500-year history of the Western art form of opera. On Friday night, the Canadian Opera Company gave the second performance of its production of Handel's Semele, designed and directed by the Chinese auteur Zhang Huan. This production's arrival in New York is the cornerstone opera offering of BAM's spring season, and a chance for this city to hear this excellent Toronto-based company in a rare American visit.

Ready for Her Lesson Scene

Joyce DiDonato gives a Master Class at Carnegie Hall.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Joyce DiDonato gives pointers to mezzo Kayliegh Decker (right) at Saturday's master class.
Photo by Chris Lee © 2015 courtesy Carnegie Hall.

As they're not always open to the paying public, a  master class taught by a major international opera star  is always a special occasion. Master classes provide deep insight into what makes the great singers tick, where a great singer guides younger artists in pursuit and perfection of their craft. When that master class is given by mezzo Joyce DiDonato in a room held high above W. 57th St. during a spectacular February snowstorm, the occasion becomes unforgettable.

Opera Review: A Well-Dressed and Interesting Monster

Handel comes back to Mostly Mozart with Acis and Galatea.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Happy three: Thomas Cooley, Yulia van Doren and Michael Williams
in Acis and Galatea at the Mostly Mozart Festival.

Not every opera composer got to tell the same story twice.

Georg Frederic Handel did though, with Acis and Galatea, the sole operatic offering of this summer's Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center. The opera contains some of the composer's most inspired late music for the stage and remains one of the composer's most beloved works.

The Superconductor Interview: Beyond the Four Seasons

One-on-one with Susan Orlando, the woman behind the Vivaldi Edition.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Antonio Vivaldi and Susan Orlando. Yes it's altered.
Original image © Naïve Classics, photo alteration by the author.

"The Vivaldi Edition is realy big. It's made a big splash!"

The speaker is Susan Orlando, director of the Vivaldi Edition, which releases complete recordings of the composer's operas on Naïve Classics. An American viola da gamba player who lives in Turin, Italy. she has been integral in showing listeners that there is far more to Vivaldi's vast output than The Four Seasons. Vivaldi, who lived and worked in Venice from (1678-1741) wrote ninety-four operas (counting pastiches. Just twenty of them have survived.

"We are doing for Vivaldi what the Germans did for Bach in the 20th century," Ms. Orlando said in a recent telephone interview. "In Europe, we're well on our way. Opera Zurich is starting to do full staged versions of the operas. Aix-en-Provence is doing a Vivaldi opera. So we're starting slowly just as they did with Handel."

Metropolitan Opera Preview: The Enchanted Island

It's time to go back to the Island as the Met revives its baroque pastiche.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Underwater love: Danielle de Niese (in drysuit) and Plácido Domingo (with trident)
in a scene from Act I of The Enchanted Island.
Photo by Ken Howard © 2011 The Metropolitan Opera.

(Editor's note: As this is the Met's revival of a pastiche, this preview is largely built from the January 5 Superconductor review of The Enchanted Island "Down With the Ship (Slight Return.)" You've got to have your fun when you can get it. )

"Pastiche, the art of pasting together songs by different composers to make a new, playable work of art, has a long history, from the Shakesperean masques of Henry Purcell to Baz Luhrmann's film Moulin Rouge!. By combining Shakespeare's The Tempest with characters from A Midsummer Night's Dream, Mr. Sams and Mr. Gelb (working with baroque conductor William Christie) created a sampler platter of the genre.

Opera Preview: A French Double Bill of Distinction

Opera Lafayette returns to Lincoln Center.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

A scene from the Fall 2013 performance of Les Femmes Vengées.
Photo by Louis Forget © 2013 Opera Lafayette.

This week marks the return of Opera Lafayette to New York. This bold and justly celebrated Washington DC-based ensemble offers intimate operatic performances of excellent quality at Lincoln Center's Rose Theater, the venue that is normally home to Jazz at Lincoln Center.

Opera Review: An Invasion, Tastefully Decorated

The Juilliard School presents Handel's Radamisto.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Radamisto (John Holiday) consoles Zenobia (Virginie Verrez) in a scene from Handel's Radamisto.
Photo by Nan Melville © 2013 The Juilliard School.

The Juilliard Opera is more than just a student ensemble--this is one of the most innovative companies at Lincoln Center. Each season, the students and guest artists at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater find ways to present a vast and diverse repertory. On Wednesday night, Juilliard opened its 2013 opera season with a new production of Handel's Radamisto by James Darrah. The performances, featuring the school period ensemble Juilliard 415, marked the conservatory debut of conductor Julian Wachner.

Opera Review: The Cyclops Who Loved Me

Le Concert d’Astrée plays the White Light Festival.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Conductor Emmanuelle Haïm brought Le Concert d'Astrée to this year's White Light Festival.
Photo by Simon Fowler © 2013 Virgin Classics courtesy Lincoln Center.

George Frederic Handel was one of the most prolific composers of operas and oratorio in the 18th century, creating an enormous amount of material for the human voice. On Saturday night, Lincoln Center hosted one of the composer's rarely heard early works: Aci, Galatea e Polifemo, commissioned in Naples in 1708. The composer was just 22 years old. The work was presented by the French period ensemble Le Concert d'Astrée under the banner Metamorphosis, part of the performing arts organization's fourth annual White Light Festival.

Opera Review: Slaughter on Tenth Avenue

Opera Omnia presents The Return of Ulysses.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Bad things happened when Ulysses came home in 1178 B.C.
Image from classical antiquity.

The brief silence of New York in early September as the city gears up for the coming opera and concert season was interrupted on Tuesday night, as Wesley Chinn's company Opera Omnia unveiled a new production of Monteverdi's The Return of Ulysses (in an English translation) at the Baryshniknov Arts Center on the W. 37th St.

Mr. Chinn's company does not appear often (this is just the third Opera Omnia production in the last six years) but when it does, they offer a chance to hear some interesting young singers specializing in the repertory of the 17th century. Here, they took Monteverdi's late masterpiece and trimmed it to a lean two and a half hours, omitting much of the opera's sweep, mythic grandeur and humor. The plus: the production retold the story in a concise, clear way that was ideal for the newcomer.

Concert Review: The Departed and the Heroic

The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment pays tribute to Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. 
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Lorraine Hunt Lieberson in Peter Sellars' production of Theodora at Glyndebourne.
Photo by Mike Hoban © 1996 Glyndebourne Festival.

On Thursday night, the Mostly Mozart Festival welcomed the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment for a special concert of Handel arias and orchestral works, specifically dedicated to the memory of Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. (who succumbed to breast cancer in 2006) was one of the premiere mezzo-sopranos of the modern age, a key member of a generation of singers responsible for renewing the public's interest in the operas of Handel and baroque repertory in general.

The Superconductor Interview: Victoria Crutchfield

The director brings L'Incoronazione di Poppea to Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Fresco from the Villa de Poppaea at Oplontis in southern Italy.
This house was built for her by the Roman Emperor Nero.

Can an opera from 1642 work in today's culture? That's the question facing director Victoria Crutchfield. Her new production of L'Incoronazione di Poppea ("The Coronation of Poppaea") is part of Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble's 10th anniversary Summer Repertoire Project. Superconductor had time for a few quick words with the director, whose production opens at the E. 13th St. Theater.