Opera Warhorses

On October 24, 1956 our mothers drove Stephen and myself from San Diego to the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles where I saw my Italian Opera — Verdi’s “Simon Boccanegra” with Leonard Warren, Renata Tebaldi and Boris Christoff. Instead of attending the performance, our moms waited outside, and then had the pleasure of driving us [...]

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Verdi’s “Ballo in Maschera” returned to the San Francisco Opera with the role of Amelia reprised by Deborah Voigt.  She again proved herself to be a full-voiced Verdian dramatic soprano, in a role she had sung 16 years ago here in the excellent company of Ermanno Mauro.  Her Gustavo/Riccardo in the 2006 performance was Marcus [...]

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After much anticipation Los Angeles Opera’s new and dazzling Don Carlo arrived as, without any doubt, one of the 10 best productions I’ve seen in LA since enjoying opera in LA since the nifty-fifties (seen Sept 20 and to be seen again Sept 28!!).  It was advertised widely in the  LA press as (quote) “One [...]

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