Review – Canadian Opera Company, Eugene Onegin by P.I. Tchaikovsky, conducted by Johannes Debus, directed by Robert Carsen, designed by Michael Levine, Four Seasons Centre, Sept. 30 to Nov. 3, 2018. I actually saw this production when it debuted at the Metropolitan Opera in 1997, and I thought it was brilliant – a magical blend […]
Introduction to Unsound Toronto Does Halloween Two extraordinary concerts are taking place at the Bluma Appel Theatre on Fri. Oct. 27 and Fri. Nov. 3, which marks the third incarnation of Unsound Toronto, the brainchild of Unsound Festival artistic director Mat Schulz and executive director Malgorzata (Gosia) Plysa, based in Krakow, Poland. Those first two […]
For bel canto fanatics, (among which number I count myself), the COC production of Rossini’s Maometto II (1820) will be nirvana. For others, the composer’s florid musical style, expressed through non-stop ornamentation, will seem like coloratura torture, and, not surprisingly, there were a significant number of early departures who did not come back after the […]
Brilliant conducting by Italian maestro Paolo Carignani, coupled with the sensational singing of French mezzo-soprano Clémentine Margaine as Carmen, and the passionate delivery of Canadian tenor David Pomeroy as Don José, make the COC’s production of Bizet’s warhorse worth the price of admission. All, however, is not perfect. Bizet’s Carmen can be a two-edged sword. […]
At the recent Sondra Radvanovsky concert at Koerner Hall, my former boss at Classical 96 FM joked that I had discovered the soprano who is now considered the belle of the opera world. That is not far from the truth in terms of Toronto. He remembered when I came back from Spoleto Festival USA in […]
