'Your papers, please' must never be heard in America
Independent voices from the TWT Communities
"Show Boat" is Francesca Zambello's directing debut in her role as artistic director of the WNO, succeeding Placido Domingo.
Marcello Giordani struggled mightily, his top notes effortful and thin. It turned out the tenor's third performance of Aeneas in the Metropolitan Opera's revival of Berlioz's "Les Troyens" would be his last.
Vesselina Kasarova's repertoire ranges from Donizetti to Wagner. Critics rave over her voice and her character depictions are the gold standard for young singers aspiring to opera stardom.
There's opera, and there are musicals, but whatever happened to "never the twain shall meet"? These days they do meet — in the Washington National Opera's forthcoming season and elsewhere — and world-class opera singers are happy to appear in them.
Salvatore Licitra, a tenor known in his Italian homeland as the "new Pavarotti" for his potent voice and considerable stamina, died Monday at age 43 after spending nine days in a coma following a motorscooter accident in Sicily.
Puccini would have been proud.
"But there are a lot of changes from that production," she said. "The cast is different. You generally keep working on these pieces and making them better."
New artistic director Francesca Zambello pilots Washington National Opera's 'Show Boat' →
Paired with Ben Heppner's Aeneas when Francesca Zambello's staging debuted in 2003, Voigt still possesses gleaming high notes, but her lower register was rough and underpowered.
