After a 33% budget cut for Madrid’s Teatro Real was announced, artistic director, Gerard Mortier, said he will keep fighting for the theatre in this ‘dangerous’ time for culture. Mortier criticized the Secretary of State for Culture, Jose Maria Lassalle , who, he says, remains locked in his office, unwilling to discuss the situation. Mortier, who was director of the…
Camilla Williams, the first black woman to appear in a leading role with a major US opera company, aged 92. She made her debut in May 1946 in the title role of Madam Butterfly with the New York City Opera. Williams’ debut performance came nearly nine years before Marian Anderson became the first African-American singer to appear…
The American baritone Cornell MacNeil died on July 15, he was 88. He was best known for his many Verdi roles. From 1959 to 1987, he sang 26 roles in more than 600 appearances at the Metropolitan Opera, including more than 100 performances of Rigoletto. In a 2007 interview James Levine commented: The larger and more…
Prima Donna, the Bastille Day-set opera by Grammy Award-nominated singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright, will make its Gotham debut in spring 2012 at the New York City Opera instead of the Metropolitan Opera, for which it was originally conceived. NYCO said on Monday that the company would produce it sometime next season. The Met and Lincoln Center…
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