Gerald Finley is one of opera’s finest artists. His exceptionally beautiful tone has made him one of the world’s top Mozart baritones, but he doesn’t only do Mozart; currently he is playing Athanaël at the Met, opposite Ailyn Pérez’s Thaïs, and last season he played the title role in Guillaume Read more…
Adam Plachetka is an exciting young performer who will soon be playing the title role in the Met’s run of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro. The Czech bass-baritone is renowned for his interpretations of Mozart and bel canto roles. Adam is one of those people whom everyone loves to be Read more…
Baritone Jacques Imbrailo will soon be playing Count Almaviva in Minnesota Opera’s production of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro (Le nozze di Figaro). Imbrailo, a renowned interpreter of Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd, took some time out of his busy schedule to discuss his background, The Marriage of Figaro, and his Read more…
Massimo Cavalletti is a natural talent; the 38 year-old baritone just sang his 100th Met performance of Puccini’s La bohème, the opera he made his Met debut in only six years ago. It’s hard to believe that Cavalletti’s first experience with opera occurred when he 20 years old. Within a Read more…
Amanda Majeski has one of those commanding yet intimate soprano voices that makes you forget everything else going on around you. When you first hear her, you know immediately that she is the real thing. Playing Donna Elvira at the Met this year in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Majeski sat down Read more…
Italian bass Ferruccio Furlanetto has a powerful, unforgettable sound. I know him primarily through Mozart – as Figaro in a famous Met recording of Le Nozze di Figaro and as Don Alfonso in another James Levine led production of Così fan tutte (this one was with the Vienna Philharmonic). Although Read more…
Diva Dawn Upshaw has a light and sparkly soprano sound, ideally suited to soubrette roles. It was in just such a role that I first heard her – as Susanna in a Metropolitan Opera recording of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro.
Upshaw was born in 1960 in Nashville, Tennessee. She studied at the Manhattan School of Music, after which she won numerous awards, including the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 1984 and the Walter M. Naumburg Competition in 1985. She made her Met debut in 1984. Upshaw was diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer in 2006, for which she received treatment.
I first noticed Kiri Te Kanawa because she kept appearing on opera CD box sets I bought – Le Nozze di Figaro, Rigoletto, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, etc. She had a gorgeous, warm, unmistakable lyric soprano voice that seemed especially suited to Mozart. She has gone on to become one of my favorite divas.
Many people (shall we say most?) find opera somewhat inaccessible. I get that – it’s old, boring, and sung in foreign languages. It’s also not easy to break free from the “it ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings” vibe; how often is opera depicted in shows, movies, or cartoons as some fat lady with brass chest plates belting out god-knows-what over an 80 member orchestra? My goal: (more…)