Kidon Choi
Great ideas: Portland Opera à la Cart
EditorialA Portland Opera-style cart is a brilliant way of showcasing opera presented by one or several companies; in the same way that a picture is worth a thousand words, offering up short bites of opera to listeners is the perfect marketing campaign to lure audiences to future full-length productions.
Spotlight on: Diego Silva
Interview"I make a living from doing what I love to do, and my schedule is always changing and includes lots of travel. I never get bored because I have to study a lot of different music in different languages and there is always room for improvement."
Young singing done right: Aksel Rykkvin
NewsIt's entirely refreshing to hear 13-year old Aksel Rykkvin, Norwegian boy soprano. With early classical training, Rykkvin has already appeared with Norwegian National Opera; now, he has released an album of arias by Mozart, Handel and Bach, with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment under conductor Nigel Short.
Operalia & advertising
EditorialPromoting Domingo, in between the well-honed performances of the Operalia finalists, felt in opposition to the competition's mission. The business of advertising seemed to take over the air time between competitors. Perhaps it was the perfect opportunity for Domingo to promote his work, since the Operalia audience is the right demographic to purchase a documentary like "My Greatest Roles".
Pavarotti's "Nessun dorma" & the Trump campaign
EditorialWhat's likely is that the sweeping sounds of Puccini sounded fancy to the Trump folk, and that Pavarotti's voice sounds heroic (#winning). They're not wrong, but it just screams, "I heard this on YouTube once."
In review: The Rape of Lucretia at TSMF
ReviewIn the title role, mezzo-soprano Emma Char, was every bit of the descriptions we hear of Lucretia at the beginning of the show. Delicate, pure, and lovely on stage, she had a groundedness that I really enjoyed. The whole space seemed to calm down when she stepped on stage - which was made all the more thrilling when her character shifts to a darker place after the events of Act II.
Anne Kostalas: a year with opera singers
InterviewFilmmaker Anne Kostalas has wrapped a three-part documentary, following the lives of three young singers at Opera McGill, Schulich School of Music, Montréal. The documentary was commissioned by Patrick Hansen, head of Opera McGill, who is "thrilled at how this documentary seems like a love letter, not just to Opera McGill but to the McGill campus and all the people who study and work there."
Spotlight on: Claire Kuttler
Interview"Get right with failure (again, a constant work in progress). Keep working hard, there is value in working hard no matter the outcome. You don't know half of what you think you know. Get right with being humble. Read books. Study foreign languages more. Watch more comedies than tragedies (I still don't follow this one)."
Michael Rose on A Tale of Two Cities
InterviewThis summer, Summer Opera Lyric Theatre enters its 30th season; to celebrate, the line-up includes the world premiere of A Tale of Two Cities, a new operatic adaptation of Dickens' novel by Victor Davies and Eugene Benson. We spoke with Music Director and pianist Michael Rose about this new opera, some upcoming projects of his own, and about SOLT's mission to train young artists for the professional stage.
Hypothetical operas: The 2016 Presidential Election
HumourTrump would be a buffo bass role, clearly. Blustering, bumbling and woofy, his lines would be meaningless patter in the style of Rossini. His lines would overlap those of all other characters', interrupting in that charming way, and rambling on long after anything of possible meaning had been said.