Week of April 9-April 16, 2011

This week's Met-HD Simulcast at a theater near you Saturday, April 9, 2011, 1pm:

Rossini's comic--

LE COMTE ORY

Rossini’s vocally dazzling comedy stars bel canto sensation Juan Diego Flórez in the title role of this Met premiere production. He vies with mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, in the trouser role of Isolier, for the love of the lonely Countess Adèle, sung by soprano Diana Damrau. Bartlett Sher, director of the Met’s hit productions of The Barber of Seville and The Tales of Hoffmann, describes the world of the opera as, “a place where love is dangerous. People get hurt. That can be very funny and very painful. Rossini captures both—with the most beautiful love music Rossini ever wrote.”

Maurizio Benini; Diana Damrau, Joyce DiDonato, Susanne Resmark, Juan Diego Flórez, Stéphane Degout, Michele Pertusi

Synopsis of Le Comte Ory

http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/history/stories/synopsis.aspx?id=389

To see a 1998 YouTube of Juan Diego Flores in the main role, with soprano Annick Massis click on "Week of..." above

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This week's Met radio broadcast:

LE COMTE ORY

You  can listen to the Met Opera Saturday afternoon broadcasts at 1pm on Harvard Radio, 95.3 in the Boston area or live-streaming online at http://www.whrb.org/

Synopsis of Le Comte Ory

http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/history/stories/synopsis.aspx?id=389

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This week on WSBE, Rhode Island Public Television:

Thaïs

Renée Fleming

 Great Performances at the Met

WSBE (36.2) (RI Cox Cable 808) (RI Fios 478) (In Massachusetts, Comcast 294) Saturday, April 9 —  8:00 pm; Sunday,  April 10 — 3:00 am; Monday, April 11  — 12:00 am Duration: 120 minutes Soprano Renée Fleming stars in the title role of Jules Massenet's "Thaïs," about an Egyptian courtesan who causes the fall from grace of a monk (Thomas Hampson). Nicias: Michael Schade. Palémon: Alain Vernhes. La Charmeuse: Leah Partridge. duration: 150 min

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OPERA ON THE INTERNET WITH  

DAVE D'AGUANNO  

The Met also has a LIVE HD-transmission available to all of us, scheduled for this coming Saturday, April 9. It's Rossini's comic opera "Le Comte Ory" which promises to be of particular interest, as it features one of the leading Rossini tenors of our time in the title role: Juan Diego Florez. This is one not to be missed!

(Most internet radio stations will be relaying an audio-only broadcast of the performance if you are unable to watch it at one of our nearby movie theatres.)

I'd also like to mention that the Rossini opera is just the first of THREE HD-transmissions scheduled for this month, the other two being "Capriccio" by Richard Strauss on April 23, starring Renee Fleming, and then on April 30, Verdi's "Il Trovatore."

If you're in the mood for a Wagner fix on (rather than Rossini), you can always check out the performance of "Siegfried" that will be broadcast on Saturday, but which actually took place on March 1, at one of Paris's leading opera houses.

(http://sites.radiofrance.fr/francemusique/accueil/)

Enjoy!

DAVE 

Do you think you might want 
to make the trek to Boston?

Dawn Upshaw, soprano

Friday, April 29, 2011, 8pm,

NEC’s Jordan Hall

Boston, MA

http://purchase.tickets.com/buy/TicketPurchase?organ_val=229&pid=6829205

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At the Cutler Majestic Theater

219 Tremont Street, Boston

OPERA BOSTON

MARIA PADILLA 

Described by Donizetti scholar William Ashbrook as "one of the most unfairly neglected of Donizetti's mature operas," Maria Padilla is a tour de force loosely based on the life of a woman who secretly married King Pedro the Cruel of Castile. In this new production, beloved soprano Barbara Quintiliani returns to a role she triumphed in at the 2009 Wexford Festival. In her Ireland debut: "the evening belonged, thrilling and unequivocally, to Barbara Quintiliani as Maria. . . She has a remarkable range of colors at her disposal, her coloratura is superbly executed. . . She also has one of the rarest qualities: an innate understanding of how to build this music to a thrilling climax, with superb high notes" (Opera News)

Sung in Italian with English titles

Cast

Barbara Quintiliani as Maria Padilla
Adriano Graziani as Don Ruiz
Laura Vlasak Nolen as Ines
DongWon Kim as Don Pedro 
Young Bok Kim as Don Ramiro
Yeghishe Manucharyan as Don Luigi
Glorivy Arroyo as Francisca
John Salvi as Don Alfonso di Pardo

Conducted by Gil Rose
Directed by Julia Pevzner

Performances

Friday,
May 6, at 7:30 pm

Sunday,
May 8, at 3:00 pm

Tuesday,
May 10, 2010 at 7:30 pm

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BOSTON LYRIC OPERA

April 29, May 1m, 4, 6, 8m, 10, 2011 At the Citi Performing Arts CenterSM Shubert Theatre

BLO premiere and new BLO production Ah, the thrill of the chase. Over hill, over dale, girdling the Earth in 40 minutes—when the words are mostly Shakespeare, even the libretto sings. Britten gives us a stageful of sprites and mortals in a touching and very funny take: a dreamscape. Or is it a nightmare? Depends on how you feel about unrequited love, and donkeys.