Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition: Metropolitan Opera, New York, 17.3.2024. (RP)
Five Singers win top prizes at the Metropolitan Opera’s 2024 Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition
Featured Articles and News
You needed to be there: a (p)review of NT Live’s The Motive and the Cue as Gielgud and Burton clash in 1964
United Kingdom NT Live – Jack Thorne’s The Motive and the Cue: Currently on at London’s Noel Coward Theatre until 23.3.2024. It was filmed live in 2023 (directed by Matthew Amos) at London’s Lyttleton Theatre and it will be available in cinemas from 21.3.2024. (JPr)
SF Symphony in 2024-25 and news about Esa-Pekka Salonen
Esa-Pekka Salonen and San Francisco Symphony to part ways after one final season
Esa-Pekka Salonen surprised almost everyone in 2018 by signing a five-year contract to be San Francisco Symphony’s music director after he had told the world that he did not want to have that role again. His tenure began in 2020 – unfortunately coinciding with the onset of COVID-19 – and now there will not be another term. He will leave the post when his five-year contract ends in June 2025. The organization has just over a year to decide who might be next to lead the orchestra.
San Francisco Opera in 2024-2025
San Francisco Opera takes a step back in the 2024-25 season
After a 2023-24 season that featured three significant and well-received new operas, San Francisco Opera this week announced a 2024-25 season with fewer performances and only one company premiere – The Handmaid’s Tale, which dates from 2000.
R.I.P. Claire Seymour (1970-2024)
It is with great sadness that we announce the recent sudden and unexpected death of Claire Seymour. After falling ill at the New Year and after a spell in hospital all seemed well and she was as active as ever working with students, marking exams, reviewing, researching and being an invaluable help to Gary Hoffman’s Opera Today and my Seen and Heard International.
The Callas Imprint: A Centennial Biography available now
In December 2023 Sophia Lambton’s The Callas Imprint: A Centennial Biography finally came out
Twelve years in the making, reaps 3395 sources spanning 80 years across twenty-one countries to swivel readers through the singer’s on- and offstage scenes — escorting them through the confounding double life of all performers.
On medici.tv: an oddly programmed concert of Berlioz and Wagner from the Strasbourg Philharmonic
France Berlioz and Wagner: Joyce DiDonato (mezzo-soprano), Michael Spyres (baritenor), Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg / John Nelson and Ludovic Morlot (conductors). Livestreamed on medici.tv (directed by Jean-Pierre Loisill) from the Palais de la Musique et des Congrès, Strasbourg, France, 26.1.2024. (JPr)
Seen in cinemas: Dutch National Ballet’s Giselle with Olga Smirnova is conceived on a grand scale
Netherlands Dutch National Ballet’s Giselle: Dancers of Dutch National Ballet, Dutch Ballet Orchestra / Ermanno Florio (conductor). Filmed (directed by Isabelle Julien) at the Dutch National Opera & Ballet. Amsterdam, on 26 and 29.10.2023 and released worldwide in cinemas only from 21.1.2024. (JPr)
