Category Archives: Uncategorized
Gottfried Benn and the Philosophy of Mind
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 23rd February 2025Gunter Wolf is a German physician who has long been interested in the interaction of medicine and the humanities. His latest publication is about the author and physician Gottfried Benn (1886-1956). He is not nearly as well known to English-speaking audiences as he is in Germany. Wolf’s essay, which can be downloaded below, is intended…
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Met Announces 25-26 Season
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 20th February 2025The Met has announced the repertory for next season. It can be viewed in the PDF below or on the Met’s website. A few observations about the upcoming season: While there is only one opera by Verdi and one by Wagner there will be two by Bellini. Both La Sonnambula and I Puritani will be…
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Respighi and Verdi
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 11th December 2024Below are the program notes I wrote for the upcoming concert of the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra – Saturday, January 18, 2025. Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936) was the only important Italian composer of his era better known for his instrumental works than for his operas. Though he wrote nine operas, they are almost never performed. His orchestral compositions, on the…
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Finale 43 – Three From Anna Bolena
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th November 2024Today is a Black Friday special – three finales for the price of one. Donizetti’s Anna Bolena was his 37th opera and his first success. He is the undoubted holder of the Persistence in Lyric Composition Award. He wrote over 30 operas after Bolena, a few of which were also successful. Anna Bolena is about…
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Tucker Video – Vesti La Giubba (1974)
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 2nd November 2024On November 16, the great American tenor Richard Tucker performed Canio in Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci at the Met. The opera was recorded and intended to be released paired with Cavalleria Rusticana, featuring Franco Corelli in the leading tenor role. The project was never marketed for some unknown (at least to me) legal reason. Tucker’s reading of…
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Grounded in HD
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 19th October 2024The Met telecast Jeanine Tesori’s new opera today. It also opened the company’s current season. The opera is an extended version of librettist George Brant’s one-woman play of the same name. The protagonist (Jess) is a woman jet pilot who is grounded because she gets pregnant after a one-night stand. She decides to keep the…
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The Tales of Hoffmann in HD – 2024
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 5th October 2024Bart Sher’s production of Offenbach’s valedictory masterpiece was telecast by the Met for the third time. The last time was in 2015. Each time it’s different. I’ll start with the opera’s ending. It has more versions than a politician’s biography. Today after what once was the end of a Met staging of The Tales of…
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Finale 41 – A Masked Ball
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 2nd October 2024First performed on February 17, 1859, Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera had a long labor and difficult birth. Originally intended for the Teatro San Carlo in Naples it had so much trouble with the censors that Verdi withdrew the work and moved it to the Teatro Apollo in Rome. The biggest problem disturbing the censors…
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Shostakovich Symphony #13- Babi Yar
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 27th July 2024Shostakovich’s Symphony #13 was composed in 1962. It was written for bass soloist, bass chorus, and large orchestra. It consists of five movements, each a setting of a poem by Yevgeny Yevtushenko. Commonly called the Babi Yar Symphony after the first poem set to music, it resembles a dramatic cantata more than a symphony. But…
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Maria Jeritza
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 16th June 2024Maria Jeritza (1887-1982) was one of opera’s most glamorous and accomplished sopranos of the pre-World War I years extending to the early 30s. She was famous for her large and silvery spinto and her flamboyant acting which sometimes crossed the border into overacting. Born Marie Jedličková in the Moravian city of Brno, she trained at…
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