Opera Theatre + Broadway News

Opera Idaho Presents Free Art Song Recital Today, 5/20

(5/20/2012) Come today, May 20th at 2:30 for Opera Idaho's Art Song Recital and experience some of the best voices in the Treasure Valley.

Photo Flash: AINADAMAR at Long Beach Opera Plays Tonight, 5/20

(5/20/2012) The Terrace Theater at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center is set to present AINADAMAR, the operatic biography of Federico Garcia Lorca, late this month for a limited engagement. The show is scheduled to perform for two nights only tonight, May 20 and May 26. See photos of Suzan Hanson, Peabody Southwell and Ani Maldjian on stage below!

American Opera Projects Presents COMPOSERS & THE VOICE: FIRST GLIMPSE 2012, 5/20-5/21

(5/20/2012) Today, May 20 and Monday, May 21, 2012 at 8pm American Opera Projects (AOP) will present COMPOSERS & THE VOICE: FIRST GLIMPSE 2012, the first public presentation of compositions developed during this season's Composers & the Voice program. Audiences will hear songs written by five emerging composers - Sidney Marquez Boquiren, Mikael Karlsson, Robert Paterson, Rachel Peters, and Ronnie Reshef - and one composer/librettist team, Zach Redler and Sara Cooper, who were chosen by AOP to spend a year creating new works focusing on the operatic voice. The performances will be held at South Oxford Space in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, the home of AOP. Tickets are $15 general admission, $10 for students/seniors and are available at www.operaprojects.org.

Franz Welser-Möst Conducts Cleveland Orchestra's SALOME at Carnegie & Severance Halls, Now thru 5/26

(5/19/2012) Franz Welser-Möst conducts The Cleveland Orchestra and an international cast in concert performances of Richard Strauss’s SALOME at Severance Hall tonight, May 19, at 8 p.m. and Saturday, May 26, at 8 p.m.

Varla Jean Merman Stars in THE MEDIUM at P-Town's Art House, Now thru 6/3

(5/18/2012) Varla Jean Merman aka Jeffery Roberson plays the title role in Menotti’s THE MEDIUM at The Art House directed by Donna Drake. Produced by Provincetown Counter Productions in association with Mark Cortale this production runs from tonight, May 18th – June 3rd. Elizabeth Hastings who has conducted for both New York City Opera and College Light Opera on Cape Cod will music direct. The cast also includes Stefanie Izzo as Monica, Edmund Bagnell as Toby, Shannon Carson as Mrs. Gobineau, Peter Kendall Clark as Mr. Gobineau and Maria Elena Armijo as Mrs. Nolan. This production is slated to transfer to the Marjorie S. Deane Little Theatre in NY for a limited engagement in the fall. For Art House tickets please visit www.ptownarthouse.com or call 508-487-9222.

THE ENCHANTED ISLAND Airs on PBS' 'Great Performances at the Met', Tonight, 5/18

(5/18/2012) The Enchanted Island, a world premiere work that combines Baroque music with a new, English-language libretto featuring characters from Shakespeare's The Tempest and A Midsummer Night's Dream, and a starry cast including Danielle de Niese, Joyce DiDonato, David Daniels, Plácido Domingo, and Luca Pisaroni, will air on THIRTEEN's Great Performances at the Met Friday, May 18 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings).

Peter Sellars Speaks at CalArts Commencement, Receives Honorary Degree Today, 5/18

(5/18/2012) California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) President Steven D. Lavine has announced that world-renowned opera, theater and film director Peter Sellars will be the 2012 recipient of CalArts’ honorary Doctor of Arts degree. CalArts will celebrate Sellars’ originality, creativity and unflagging commitment to the social good at its graduation ceremony today, May 18 beginning at 6 p.m. At the ceremony, the honorary degree recipient will share his reflections on life and art with the CalArts class of 2012.

Opera Idaho Presents Free Art Song Recital, 5/20

(5/17/2012) Come this Sunday, May 20th at 2:30 for Opera Idaho's Art Song Recital and experience some of the best voices in the Treasure Valley.

Photo Flash: Company XIV's Baroque Burlesque Opera JUDGE ME PARIS Opens Tonight in Brooklyn

(5/17/2012) Company XIV, in association with Morningside Opera and SIREN Baroque, presents the World Premiere of Judge Me Paris, a Baroque Burlesque Opera, directed and choreographed by Austin McCormick. Judge Me Paris includes excerpts from John Eccles and John Weldon’s Baroque opera The Judgment of Paris, sung by Morningside Opera, with a libretto by William Congreve, Baroque music performed by SIREN Baroque, and additional text by Jeff Takacs. The show opens tonight, May 17, in Brooklyn.

Carmen Giannattasio to Replace Sondra Radvanovsky in the Met's IL TROVATORE, 10/12, 17, 20 & 25

(5/17/2012) The following casting changes and additions have been made to the Met’s 2012-13 season.

Company XIV Presents World Premiere of JUDGE ME PARIS, Now thru 5/27

(5/17/2012) Company XIV, in association with Morningside Opera and SIREN Baroque, presents the World Premiere of JUDGE ME PARIS, a Baroque Burlesque Opera, directed and choreographed by Austin McCormick. JUDGE ME PARIS includes excerpts from John Eccles and John Weldon’s Baroque opera The Judgment of Paris, sung by Morningside Opera, with a libretto by William Congreve, Baroque music performed by SIREN Baroque, and additional text by Jeff Takacs.

Peter Sellars to Speak at CalArts Commencement, Receive Honorary Degree, 5/18

(5/16/2012) California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) President Steven D. Lavine has announced that world-renowned opera, theater and film director Peter Sellars will be the 2012 recipient of CalArts’ honorary Doctor of Arts degree. CalArts will celebrate Sellars’ originality, creativity and unflagging commitment to the social good at its graduation ceremony on Friday, May 18 beginning at 6 p.m. At the ceremony, the honorary degree recipient will share his reflections on life and art with the CalArts class of 2012.

Susan Graham Announces Upcoming Appearances

(5/16/2012) Fresh from her appearances in Lehár’s The Merry Widow at the Opéra National de Paris and Berlioz’s La mort de Cléopâtre with the Hong Kong Philharmonic, as well as a successful run of Australian recitals in Melbourne and Sydney, Susan Graham continues.

NYC Opera’s Spring Gala in Central Park Features Deborah Voigt Tonight, 5/16

(5/16/2012) New York City Opera celebrates the company’s 2011-12 season with New York’s civic leaders tonight, May 16, with its Spring Gala: An Evening with Deborah Voigt. The event takes place at the historic Loeb Central Park Boathouse in Manhattan and feature cocktails and gondola rides on the lake, as well as a formal dinner and dancing to the Jazz Age sounds of the Grammy Award-winning Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks.

Sir Andrew Davis Extends Contract as Lyric Opera of Chicago's Music Director Through The 2020/21 Season

(5/15/2012) Anthony Freud, general director of Lyric Opera of Chicago, announced today that the company is reporting a breakeven operating performance for fiscal year 2012. Lyric has operated in the black for 24 of the past 25 years—a record among the country’s major not-for-profit music and performing-arts companies.

Dan Singer and Jacqueline Thompson Set for Enrico Caruso Room Opera Night, 5/15

(5/15/2012) The headline performers for tonight's May 15 Opera Night at the Enrico Caruso Room at Grotta Azzurra Ristorante in Little Italy are Dan Singer and Jacqueline Thompson.

Austin Pendleton Directs Boston Midsummer Opera's DON PASQUALE, 7/25-29

(5/14/2012) For its seventh season Boston Midsummer Opera (BMO) presents the comic piece, Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, playing at the Tsai Performance Center at Boston University for three performances only, July 25, 27, and 29. Obie Award winner/Tony Award nominee Austin Pendleton directs the fully staged and costumed production. Music director and nationally acclaimed conductor Susan Davenny Wyner leads the performances, which will be performed with orchestra and sung in English. Metropolitan Opera bass Ricardo Lugo will sing the role of Don Pasquale.

The Unconventional Trumps the Expected as Peak Performances Announces 2012-13 Season

(5/14/2012) Peak Performances has been rapidly making Montclair State University a major cultural destination, even for New Yorkers. Nine premieres including stunning, often startling, new music, dance and theater works by composers David T. Little, Laurie Anderson, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Toshi Reagon; choreographers Benjamin Millepied, Richard Alston, Vusi Mdoyi, Jasmin Vardimon; directors Robert Wilson and Romeo Castellucci are among the highlights of the 2012/13 Peak Performances season. Peak is where exceptions rule.

Opera in Cinema Presents The Teatro Alla Scala Production of Peter Grimes Live in HD, 5/24

(5/14/2012) Opera in Cinema/Emerging Pictures presents THE TEATRO ALLA SCALA PRODUCTION OF PETER GRIMES, LIVE in HD, starring John Graham-Hall, Susan Gritton, Christopher Purves, and Felicity Palmer, Thursday, May 24th, 2:00 p.m. at Big Cinemas Manhattan Theater, 239 East 59th Street. Running time is 175 minutes.

FAUST Airs on PBS' 'Great Performances at the Met' Today, 5/13

(5/13/2012) Jonas Kaufmann, Marina Poplavskaya, and René Pape in New Production of Gounod’s Faust on THIRTEEN’s Great Performances at the Met, today, May 13 at 12 p.m. on PBS stations, with director Des McAnuff in his Met debut, with Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting the classic opera for the first time at the Met, Three of the opera world’s leading stars—Jonas Kaufmann, Marina Poplavskaya, and René Pape—sing the principal roles in a new production of Gounod’s Faust, directed by Tony Award winner Des McAnuff in his Met debut. Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts his first Met performances of the opera, which airs on THIRTEEN’s Great Performances at the Met Sunday, May 13 at 12 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). In New York, THIRTEEN premiered the program Thursday, May 10 at 8:30 p.m. with an encore presentation today, May 13 at 12:30 p.m.

Opera Theatre of Connecticut Hosts 15th Amici Vocal Competition Today, 5/12

(5/12/2012) Opera Theater of Connecticut, the state’s oldest professional opera company, welcomes an audience for its 15th Amici Vocal Competition today, May 12, 2012. Come hear some of the state’s finest young opera singers in the intimate setting of the Andrews Memorial Theater, 54 East Main Street in Clinton, CT.

Photo Flash: First Look at AINADAMAR at Long Beach Opera

(5/11/2012) The Terrace Theater at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center is set to present AINADAMAR, the operatic biography of Federico Garcia Lorca, late this month for a limited engagement. The show is scheduled to perform for two nights only on May 20 and May 26. See photos of Suzan Hanson, Peabody Southwell and Ani Maldjian on stage below!

Photo Flash: HANSEL & GRETEL at The Bronx Opera thru 5/19

(5/11/2012) The Bronx Opera follows the famed mischievous brother and sister into Ilsenstein forest to meet the echoing trees, the little Sandman, the 14 angels of protection, the little Dew Fairy, and the evil witch and her tempting gingerbread house in this classic opera based on the famed Brother Grimm story. Filled with parables about family life and struggles that ring true today. The chorus for this production is made up almost entirely of children from RiverArts Children’s Chorus, part of the Rivertowns Arts Council in Hastings-on-Hudson.

Franz Welser-Möst to Conduct Cleveland Orchestra's Performance of SALOME at Carnegie and Severance Hall 5/19-26

(5/11/2012) Franz Welser-Möst conducts The Cleveland Orchestra and an international cast in concert performances of Richard Strauss’s SALOME at Severance Hall on Saturday, May 19, at 8 p.m. and Saturday, May 26, at 8 p.m. The opera will also be presented at New York’s Carnegie Hall, on Thursday, May 24, at 8 p.m.

Amore Opera Concludes Season with LA TRAVIATA, Now thru May 27

(5/11/2012) Amore Opera concludes its third season with Verdi’s masterpiece, La Traviata, conducted by Gregory Ortega, and staged by Amore Opera’s Artistic Director, Nathan Hull. La Traviata, an opera in three acts, is the tragic love story of the famed French courtesan with a heart of gold, Violetta, and her arduous suitor, Alfredo Germont. Although they risk everything to be together, their pure and devoted love is thwarted by societal pressures and, ultimately, death. La Traviata is presented in repertoire from tonight, May 11th through the 27th.

René Pape Announces Upcoming Performances

(5/10/2012) After performances in Franz Schmidt’s oratorio The Book With Seven Seals under Fabio Luisi in Vienna (May 13-14), René Pape will sing in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony under Daniel Barenboim at Milan’s La Scala, in the presence of Pope Benedict XVI (June 1).

THE ENCHANTED ISLAND Airs on PBS' 'Great Performances at the Met', 5/18

(5/9/2012) The Enchanted Island, a world premiere work that combines Baroque music with a new, English-language libretto featuring characters from Shakespeare's The Tempest and A Midsummer Night's Dream, and a starry cast including Danielle de Niese, Joyce DiDonato, David Daniels, Plácido Domingo, and Luca Pisaroni, will air on THIRTEEN's Great Performances at the Met Friday, May 18 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings).

Demi Lovato, Wilco, Broadway Favorites in Concert, Opera and More Headline Wolf Trap's 41st Season

(5/9/2012) Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts has announced its entire 2012 Summer season, featuring 92 live performances and 108 days at the Filene Center amphitheater, nine evenings of opera at The Barns at Wolf Trap, and 34 performances at Wolf Trap's Children's Theatre-in-the-Woods. See below for recent additions to the line-up and schedule.

Katarina Dalayman Sings in the Met's SIEGFRIED Tonight; Deborah Voigt is Ill, 5/9

(5/9/2012) Katarina Dalayman will sing the role of Brünnhilde in this evening’s performance of Wagner’s Siegfried, replacing Deborah Voigt, who is ill.

Luca Pisaroni Announces Upcoming Events

(5/9/2012) Luca Pisaroni will reprise the role of Figaro in productions of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich (May 3-13) and at the Vienna State Opera (June 3-13).

Canadian Opera Company Closes Season With SEMELE, Now thru May 26

(5/9/2012) The Canadian Opera Company’s 2011/2012 season closes with the company premiere of George Frideric Handel’s Semele in a production directed by famed Chinese visual and performance artist Zhang Huan. Joining Mr. Zhang to present Handel’s sparkling and seductive opera about the pitfalls of love affairs between gods and mortals is Italian Baroque opera specialist Rinaldo Alessandrini, who leads the COC Orchestra and Chorus. Sung in English with English SURTITLES™, Semele runs for eight performances at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts tonight, May 9 and May 11, 13, 16, 19, 22, 24 and 26, 2012.

Shana Farr, John Carelli et al. Set for Enrico Caruso Room Opera Night Tonight, 5/8

(5/8/2012) The headline performers for the next two Opera Nights at the Enrico Caruso Room at Grotta Azzurra Ristorante in Little Italy have been announced: Cabaret star Shana Farr and tenor John Carelli will share the bill on tonight, May 8, and Dan Singer and Jacqueline Thompson will headline on Tuesday, May 15.

CT's Warner Theatre Screens Encore of The Met: LIVE IN HD's LA TRAVIATA, 5/26

(5/7/2012) On Saturday, May 26 at 1pm, the Warner Theatre will present Verdi’s La Traviata, an encore presentation from The Met: Live in HD.

Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra Awarded Honorary Membership of the Vienna State Opera

(5/7/2012) Im Anschluss an die bejubelte gestrige Vorstellung von "Arabella" * unter der Leitung von GMD Franz Welser-Möst und mit Emily Magee in der Titelpartie, Tomasz Konieczny als Mandryka, Genia Kühmeier als Zdenka, Michael Schade als Matteo * wurde auf offener Bühne die Ehrenmitgliedschaft der Wiener Staatsoper an das Staatsopernorchester bzw. die Wiener Philharmoniker verliehen.

The Met Screens WAGNER'S DREAM Documentary in Theaters Today, 5/7

(5/7/2012) The Metropolitan Opera will present worldwide movie theater screenings of Robert Lepage’s new production of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, as well as Wagner’s Dream, a new documentary chronicling the creation of this ambitious new staging. In the United States and Canada, the series will begin tonight, May 7, with a screening of the documentary, directed by award-winning filmmaker Susan Froemke, and continue on May 9 with Das Rheingold, the first opera in the cycle. The entire four-part Ring cycle and documentary will be screened in many countries this spring and summer, including Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Chile, Colombia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, Peru, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

Met Opera's Wagner's RING CYCLE and More to Screen in Louisville, Beg. Tonight, 5/7

(5/7/2012) Just when you think the 2011/12 performing arts season is over, it was announced that the Metropolitan Opera will have a Summer Encore Series of 11 operas starting in early may. Stonybrook and Tinseltown will show these operas. A reliable source reports the ticket price at Stonybrook will be $12.50, not the usual $22 charged during the regular season.

Photo Flash: First Look at Wagner's RING CYCLE, to Screen in THE MET: LIVE IN HD, Beg. 5/7

(5/7/2012) The Met: Live in HD presents the cinematic premiere of Wagner's Ring Cycle and the behind-the-scenes documentary Wagner's Dream. The two-week event begins today May 7 across the U.S. and Canada. See photos from each of the operas below!

Stuart Skelton Replaces Jonas Kaufmann in the Met's DIE WALKURE Tonight, 5/7

(5/7/2012) Stuart Skelton will sing the role of Siegmund in Wagner’s Die Walküre tonight, May 7, replacing Jonas Kaufmann who is ill.

Shana Farr, John Carelli et al. Set for Enrico Caruso Room Opera Nights, 5/8 & 5/15

(5/6/2012) The headline performers for the next two Opera Nights at the Enrico Caruso Room at Grotta Azzurra Ristorante in Little Italy have been announced: Cabaret star Shana Farr and tenor John Carelli will share the bill on Tuesday, May 8, and Dan Singer and Jacqueline Thompson will headline on Tuesday, May 15.

Team Behind LEGALLY BLONDE Closes LIFE OF THE PARTY Opera Today, 5/6

(5/6/2012) Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and the Performing Arts presents the world premiere of Life Of The Party, a light opera for dark times. Following the huge success of last year's production of Kismet, director Paul Lincoln and the LaGuardia High School Opera Workshop tackle this completely original work, written and composed by Tony Award nominees Laurence O'Keefe (Legally Blonde, Bat Boy) and Nell Benjamin (Legally Blonde, Pirates!). The show plays a strictly limited run, with its last performance today, May 6th at 2:00pm.