NEWS: Minnesota Opera Announces Additional Shows Arts Music Opera Theatre by Twin Cities Arts Reader - June 22, 2017June 24, 2018 A photo of the Arizona Opera production of Don Pasquale, from which the design of Minnesota Opera's upcoming production is taken. Photo by Ed Flores. Minnesota Opera announced today that it was adding a sixth opera and three concerts to its previously announced 2017-2018 season. The season, which normally ends in May, will
REVIEW: Fine Dining, Rough Talk at Don Giovanni (Skylark Opera Theatre) Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - June 16, 2017June 17, 2017 Gabriel Preisser as Don Giovanni. Photo by Vera Mariner. At its best, Skylark Opera Theatre's Don Giovanni is an extraordinary way to experience a beloved Mozart opera. The site-specific performance at the Women's Club of Minneapolis provides ample opportunities for shaking up the traditional opera-going experience, which are ably exploited with a talented
INTERVIEW: Dan Norman on Photographing Theatre Magic Arts Dance Music Opera Theatre Visual Arts by Basil Considine - June 16, 2017June 16, 2017 A collage of theatrical photos by Dan Norman. Larger and uncropped versions are available below. Page through theatre reviews and websites in the Twin Cities and you'll see Dan Norman's name coming up again and again. In the past 12 years, Norman has become one of the most distinguished theatre photographers
INTERVIEW: Bob Neu on Skylark Opera Theatre’s Immersive Donny G. Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - June 12, 2017June 12, 2017 Photo by Vera Mariner. This week, Skylark Opera Theatre opens a site-specific production of Don Giovanni at the Women's Club in Minneapolis. This performance, which will snake through different rooms in the venue, is the company's second outing since its financial and artistic reorganization last year. The Arts Reader's Basil Considine
DC REVIEW: Delectable Appetizers in Les Indes Galantes (Opera Lafayette) Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - June 2, 2017July 5, 2017 The Opera Lafayette Orchestra. Ryan Brown leads with his violin (standing, center). Sketch by Basil Considine. The Twin Cities opera scene is blessed with several opera companies whose specialties range from the popular canon to new repertoire to site-specific and unusual spectacle. If your tastes run to Baroque operas, however, your odds of
INTERVIEW: Sharpening La Rondine: Boston Opera Collaborative and the Swallow’s Diet Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - May 18, 2017May 18, 2017 Reworking or remixing opera classics is one of the hot current trends in American opera circles. Skylark Opera Theatre's production of The Tragedy of Carmen certainly caught local opera fans' attention with a heavily streamlined, 90-minute version of the classic opera by Bizet, with packed houses and fans clamoring to see this up-close-and-personal treatment. Transforming
REVIEW: Patchy La Bohème Shines Through (Minnesota Opera) Arts Dance Music Opera Theatre Visual Arts by Basil Considine - May 10, 2017June 24, 2018 Scott Quinn (Rodolfo) and Nicole Cabell (Mimì) in Minnesota Opera's production of La Bohème. Photo by Dan Norman. Minnesota Opera's new production of La Bohème is uneven. There are parts that are exceedingly beautiful and engaging, and there are some that are noticeably not on the same level as the others. Call it
INTERVIEW: Composer Ketty Nez on Writing Opera – Music, Words, and All Arts Music Opera by Basil Considine - April 29, 2017April 30, 2017 Last December, the Metropolitan Opera staged Kaija Saariaho's L'Amour de Loin, its first production of an opera written by a female composer since 1903. William Robin of the New York Times took the occasion to interview 10 female composers about their experience writing opera and working as composers; the headline read,
FEATURE: Double Casting / INTERVIEW: Soprano Miriam Khalil on Bohème and More (Minnesota Opera) Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - April 23, 2017April 22, 2017 A photo collage of soprano Miriam Khalil. See the originals and more at MiriamKhalil.com. The economics and programming of opera during the so-called Golden Age of Opera – the mid-19th-century up to the start of the First World War – were very different than they are today. Most opera companies operated on
INTERVIEW: Soprano Nicole Cabell on Mimi, Bohème, and More (Minnesota Opera) Arts Music Opera Theatre by Basil Considine - April 22, 2017April 22, 2017 A photo collage of soprano Nicole Cabell on- and offstage. See the original photos and more at Nicole-Cabell.com. Two weeks from today, Minnesota Opera opens the last production in its 2016-2017 season: Giacomo Puccini's classic opera La Bohème. The opera's flowing, through-composed score and concise verismo narrative originally took audiences aback; within