Yes, it is good to be back
You could say last night at the Met was a typical Aprile Millo performance, if that expression were not essentially an oxymoron. “Typical” and “Millo” really don’t intersect in this dimension (maybe...
View ArticleClik here to view.
"Sorry, ah thought you said Maria CALLAS"
All right, boys, get your bold-faced fonts out. It seems that at Oprah Winfrey‘s “Legends Ball,” none other than Leontyne Price asked specially to meet fellow guest/legend Mariah Carey. La Carey (who...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Femmes Fatales
Debuting today on Il Gran Teatro della Cieca, “Femmes Fatales,” a program featuring deadly divas. Featured are complete and demented performances of L’incoronazione di Poppea, Macbeth, Samson et...
View Article"Unnatural Acts" Gala: Divas! Prizes! Filth!
Be sure to check back here on parterre.com at noon (17:00 GMT) tomorrow for the First Unnatural Acts of Opera Gala and Quiz, featuring performances by Leontyne Price, Placido Domingo, Beverly Sills,...
View ArticleThe answered questions
(1) Alessandra Marc is the soprano who was inspired by Leontyne Price‘s “Zweite Brautnacht.” (2) David Daniels’ favorite soap is “The Guiding Light.” (3) Evelyn Lear sang “The Boy from Ipanema.”
View ArticleClik here to view.
Sento, ah, more!
Posted, by some odd coincidence, to a David Daniels discussion board: “Remember, a Baroque opera has the same structure as a hard-core porn film: several minutes of boring dialogue/recitative, and then...
View ArticleChe faremo?
Due to server snafu, La Cieca has had to repost the “Che Faremo” poll. Please feel free to vote again (or for the first time!) Who should replace Lorraine Hunt Lieberson in the Met’s production of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
primary coloratura
Oh, yes, La Cieca agrees that an opera based on the life and career of Hillary Rodham Clinton sounds like a great idea. But is this really a role for David Daniels?
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Style, not sincerity, is the vital thing”
Now, don’t you go thinking that Peter Gelb doesn’t listen to his public, which intersects quite steeply, of course, with the cher public. For instance, just the other day La Cieca and a couple of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Shirt tale
Among symbolic classical tropes, one of my favorites (perhaps because only another classicist will understand it) is Nessus’ Shirt, an emblem of glory (a promotion, say, or an expensive luxury) that...
View ArticleClik here to view.
You will, David, you will
La Cieca hears that parterre fave David Daniels will get all eponymous and stuff for a world premiere opera entitled Oscar, based on the life of Oscar Wilde, for Santa Fe Opera in 2013, with Opera...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Once on this “Island”
David Daniels (left) headlines a special sneak preview of The Enchanted Island on Wednesday, December 7 at The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space. Also on hand will be Danielle de Niese, Lisette...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Our retrospection will now be all to the future
La Cieca predicts you will be seeing more of the same old puritans at the Met next season, and she’s not just talking about the ones who slouch around during intermission hissing, “You call that a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Thrace off
Nearly 30 years after a Handel opera last played there, Carnegie Hall presented The English Concert opening a three-year opera-oratorio project on Sunday afternoon with Radamisto. The event just missed...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Pyramid scheme
The Metropolitan Opera was just over 100 years old when on January 19, 1984 it premiered Rinaldo, its first ever opera by George Frideric Handel; Samson (not an opera, by the way), Giulio Cesare and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Walk on the Wilde side
After Heart of a Soldier, The Perfect American, The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene, et al., the premiere of Theodore Morrison’s Oscar in Santa Fe last Saturday came as a welcome relief. Here for...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Wedding beaux
David Daniels and Whitney Walters will be married on June 21st in Washington, DC by none other than Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. La Cieca extends her best wishes to the happy pair, and,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Return of the king
Fifteen years after his first parterre box interview, that criterion of countertenors David Daniels speaks of Oscar Wilde, Marilyn Horne, marriage and political art. parterre box: Welcome to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Born to be Wilde
Last night at The Academy of Music, one butterfly was crushed upon the proverbial wheel. Another fared much better. Cocooned in an amiable production of Theo Morrison‘s revised Oscar, David Daniels...
View Article
