Madison Opera’s Carmen So Easy to Love

Baseball may be over, but the season-opener is a home run It isn’t just that Bizet’s incarnation of Carmen, the wanton gypsy girl who ruins lives almost as quickly as the composer strung together hit numbers in his opera, seduces Don Jose so easily—she is responsible for ensnaring many a first-time listener into the world…

Madison Opera’s “Flute” Finds Plenty of Vocal Magic

Mozart’s late hybrid stage work proves a hit Friday night   Okay, let’s get this out of the way right now: Yours truly is not the optimal critic for a performance of Mozart’s The Magic Flute. I didn’t fall under its spell when I first heard it about 45 years ago, and no version since,…

University Opera Staging “Unanswers” All the Right Questions

Performance of Turn of the Screw evocatively staged   Bet you didn’t know that University Opera has a thing or two on Los Angeles Opera… Ok, forgive me a little hyperbole, but in the case of the production of Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw, there is some truth to it. It’s been at…

“Symphony Showcase” More Than Just Great Soloists

The UW Symphony Orchestra takes a starring role, too   It’s hard enough to keep up with the major professional musical groups in this town; if I have one chronic regret, it’s that I never catch up with enough of the great music-making on the UW-Madison campus. Last year I finally made it to one…