Chicago’s civic pride in the ascension of a hometown African-American family to the world stage has created intense interest in the most famous opera about an African-American community. Two weeks after President-Elect Barack Obama’s victory celebration at Chicago’s Grant Park, the Lyric Opera added Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” to its performance history. The community interest [...]
Entries from November 2008
The Zambello “Porgy and Bess” An Historic Success at Chicago’s Lyric – November 18, 2008
November 21st, 2008
Tags: 2005-2012: William's Reviews
Vargas Shines Bright in Stellar S. F. “L’Elisir d’Amore” – November 9, 2008
November 19th, 2008
Until the late 1960s, San Francisco Opera paid scant attention to Donizetti’s great romantic comic opera, “L’Elisir d’Amore”, having had only three performances of the opera in San Francisco in the first 44 seasons of the company’s history. (If this seems incredible for an international house led for its first 30 years by an Italian-born [...]
Tags: 2005-2012: William's Reviews
Family Matinee “Elixir of Love” at S. F. Opera – November 8, 2008
November 13th, 2008
Two of the production photographs shown below are from the Italian language “L’Elisir d’Amore” appearing at San Francisco Opera in repertory with two “family matinees” of the opera in English. The third is from the San Francisco Opera 2008 production of Portman’s “The Little Prince”. Production photographs of the family matinees will be added when [...]