Category Archives: Opera
Mikhail Alexandrovich
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 3rd August 2025Latvian tenor Mikhail Alexandrovich (1914-2002) was another 20th century cantor who sang more than liturgical music. Some of the others were Yossele Rosenblatt, Joseph Schmidt, and Richard Tucker. Born in Bērzpils, Vitebsk to a very poor family, his extraordinary vocal gifts were recognized when he was six years old. In 1920 he was enrolled in…
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O Paradis! from L’Africaine
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th July 2025L’Africaine was Giacomo Meyerbeer’s last opera. He started work on the project in 1852. Other activities, the unavailability of singers, and the death of his libretist Eugène Scribe delayed the completion of the opera. The full score was copied the day before Meyerbeer died in 1864. But a performing version done by the composer would…
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Turandot – Three Endings
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 18th July 2025Puccini’s last opera, Turandot, was left unfinished at his death in 1924. There were notes about the composer’s plans for the conclusion of the work that was almost complete. All that was lacking was the final scene, during which Calaf (the Unknown Prince) and Turandot declare their love. He’s already done so, but she has…
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Lakmé
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 11th July 2025Clément Philibert Léo Delibes (1836-1891) was a French composer best known for his ballets Coppélia (1870) and Sylvia (1876), as well as the opera Lakmé (1883). While the opera is still performed in France, it is rarely done outside its native country. The Met has performed the work 63 times, but its last staging was in 1947. The opera contains…
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Una Voce Poco Fa
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th July 2025Rossini’s setting of the first of Beaumarchais’s Figaro trilogy, The Barber of Seville, is arguably the greatest comic opera ever written. Its zany zest, unparalleled mirth, overwhelming energy, and musical beauty and inventiveness place it in a spot occupied only by the Marx Brothers. The Count Almaviva is infatuated with Rosina, an heiress whom her…
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Around the World in 73 Years
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 19th June 2025Memory is a highly fallible record of the past. This divergence from fact to fancy increases with age and its attendant distance from the recalled event, as well as the fog and confabulation that the accumulation of years inevitably accrues. Despite these difficulties, I started recalling all the cities in which I had heard serious…
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Opera Massacres III – Verdi and Wagner
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 13th June 2025So many different outsiders have controlled Sicily that if an alien power were to conquer Earth, it would likely start on that island. Among the temporary rulers of the place are the Greeks, the Carthaginians, the Romans, the Vandals, the Ostrogoths, the Byzantines, the Muslims, the Normans, the Angevin French, the Bourbons, and now the…
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Opera Massacres II – Berlioz and Saint-Saens
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 9th June 2025Hector Berlioz (1803-1860) completed three operas. The second of these, Les Troyens, is based on Books Two and Four of the Aeneid. Berlioz wrote the libretto himself. It took him two years to write the words and music for the opera, from 1856 to 1858. Most musicologists consider it to be his masterpiece. It’s as impressive…
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Opera Massacres I – Two by Meyerbeer
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 6th June 2025Death and opera are as linked as bacon and eggs. The subject of this short series of articles is wholesale death – death that kills not only the principals, but the supers as well. This grim occurrence often gets the composer’s best effort, which is my excuse for presenting it. I’ll start with Meyerbeer. He…
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Met Opera’s 25-26 HD Season
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 2nd June 2025The Metropolitan Opera has announced the operas that will be telecast next season. They are listed below. For further details about the telecasts and the upcoming season, please visit this link. A few comments about these shows. Two Bellini operas out of a total of eight is an oddity. The first of these will mark…
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