Metropolitan Opera Preview: Madama Butterfly

East meets West with disastrous consequences in Puccini's tragedy.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

A dancer in the opening scene of the Met's production of Madama Butterfly.
Photo courtesy the Metropolitan Opera.

The Met struck operatic gold earlier this year with its La bohéme. As another relatively new soprano, Hui He sings her first Met performances as Cio-Cio San, the company hopes that their Puccini luck continues. This is one of the greatest love stories of the operatic canon. It's a sharp commentary on American imperialism and the uncaring treatment of "natives" by "enterprising" Yankee vagabonds. It's both. It's brilliant. It's Butterfly.

Opera Review: Her Daddy Said: "A Whore"

Bard SummerScape plucks Mascagni's rare Iris.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Pimp daddy: Kyoto (Douglas Williams) menaces Iris (Talise Trevigne) in Mascagni's opera.
Photo by Cory Weaver © 2016 Bard SummerScape.

Composer Pietro Mascagni once famously said that of all his operas he regretted writing Cavalleria Rusticana first. This month, his Iris is the centerpiece of the annual Bard SummerScape festival,  held at the shiny Frank Gehry-designed Fisher Center (on the verdant grounds of Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson New York.) At Sunday's matinee performance, conductor, artistic director and Bard president Leon Botstein made a forceful case for Iris as a lost Mascagni masterwork.

Opera Review: Nagasaki, Mon Amour

Chelsea Opera does Madama Butterfly.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Promotional image for Madama Butterfly at the Chelsea Opera. © 2012 Chelsea Opera.

On Friday night, Chelsea Opera unveiled Madama Butterfly, the final opera of its eighth season. The production, mounted at St. Peter's Church in the company's home neighborhood, effectively transformed the church nave into Butterfly's Nagasaki house with a simple, but effective set.

Considering that all of Puccini's opera takes place in one location, Butterfly is an ideal project for a small company to tackle. The challenge is finding singers who can make the characters convincing and still sing Puccini's soaring melodic lines with power and finesse.

Soprano Christina Rohm showed both of those qualities, charting Butterfly's development from giggling geisha girl to a fully mature, heartbroken woman. Although her voice hardens under pressure, she made use of long experience with the complexities of the character. Ms. Rohm found her groove in the Act I love duet with Pinkerton (Daniel Rodriguez), letting her defenses melt slowly away like layers of Japanese formal dress.