Reviews, appreciation and analysis of all things opera
An operawarhorses.com review of an admirable San Francisco Opera performance of Robert Carsen’s “world treasure” production of Tchaikovsky’s “Eugene Onegin”..
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John Adams’ latest opera, whose plot is derived from the Shakesperean tragedy Antony and Cleopatra, received its world premiere at the San Francisco Opera. A run of six additional performances was scheduled to follow the world premiere. This review is of the third of the seven total performances. There is much to admire in San … Read more
Each of the following operas is scheduled for the San Francisco Opera’s 2022-23 centennial season. Dialogues of the Carmelites (Poulenc and Lavery) October 15, 18, 21, 26 and 30, 2022 Olivier Py’s production, co-produced by the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées and Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, Bruxelles, is imported to celebrate the 65th anniversary of the … Read more
The Santa Fe Opera revived Rossini’s most popular opera, “The Barber of Seville”, after its 17-year absence from the company, in a brilliant new production by Australian-born British director Stephen Barlow. First performed in 2016 at Britain’s Grange Festival in Hampshire (near Winchester), the production mixes 18th century fashions with abundant references to studiously anachronisitic … Read more
Simon O’Neill’s Tristan and Tamara Wilson’s Isolde In the first 64 years of its 65-year history, the Santa Fe Opera had never presented any of the three-act operas of German composer Richard Wagner. (These three-act operas comprise eight of the ten Wagner operas in opera’s standard repertory, excepting only “The Flying Dutchman”, last performed 34 … Read more