Tag Archives: Turandot
Turandot in HD 2022
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th May 2022Puccini’s farewell to opera returned for the third time as part of the Met’s HD series. Franco Zeffirelli’s brick for brick reconstruction of Imperial Peking will likely survive the heat death of the universe. The assembly of the Act 2 set takes longer than many of the operas in the Mets repertory. This go around…
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Turandot in HD 2019
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 12th October 2019The Met seems to have only a couple of dozen operas in its standard repertory, so when it not staging something that will likely never return (eg, Philip Glass’ Akhnaten) it must repeat itself. Such repetition is especially noticeable on its HD telecasts. Today Franco Zeffirelli’s literal recreation of ancient Peking was the first of…
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In Questa Reggia
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 8th October 2018I recently posted an article about Puccini’s final opera, Turandot, that had nothing to say about its title character. The work achieved the renown it currently enjoys (#17 on operabase’s list of most frequently performed operas) largely due to the work of Birgit Nilsson. Before Nilsson first performed the role at the Met in 1961…
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Finale 19 – Turandot Act 1
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 30th September 2018Italian opera as is currently practiced began with Rossini and ended with Puccini. All the Italian operas in the standard repertory were written between 1813 and 1924 – a little more than a century, a blink in the history of art. The last of these operas is Turandot. A magnificent achievement left incomplete at Puccini’s…
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Glitches Mar Turandot in HD
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 8th November 2009Franco Zeffirelli’s sumptuous, gaudy, excessive, over-the-top, or whatever suits your taste production of Puccini’s Turandot was broadcast in HD November 7, 2009. Unfortunately, the transmission was repeatedly interrupted by dropped audio, and occasionally video, signals. An announcement in our theater was made that the problem was global and that the Met was trying to fix…
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Turandot Without the T
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 22nd December 2008Today’s Puccini’s 150th birthday. To commemorate the occasion NPR’s Performance Today had an interview with noted Puccini expert Fred Plotkin. During its course Plotkin followed the now conventional practice of pronouncing Puccini’s last opera with its final t articulated. While this practice is pretty small beans in the course of human events it’s pedantic and…
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