Plovdiv, two hours north of the Bulgarian capital Sofia, is a surprising small city. Late February, and spring is already here. The city smells fresh and awake, of coffee and syrupy cakes. Its footprint pre-dates both Rome and Athens by 800 years; walking up the calm, pretty pedestrian main street where elegant street cafes sit […]
Tag: Opera
The Family hits Stavanger Konserthus…
The plan smacked of hysteria. Take Alt om min Familie, an opera for and by teenagers, to Stavanger with a new main-role singer, a stand-in director, new conductor and orchestra, work in a venue which no-one knew well, and pull it together on minimal rehearsal – i.e. arriving on Friday afternoon for a show the […]
Issue-aware opera
There are a couple of wonderfully self-contradicting statements in this month´s Opera Now editorial: the first states that John Adams´s Nixon in China is the most successful opera of the last 25 years in terms of total performances and exemplary box office. The second states that ” (opera is not) …a suitable vehicle for reductive […]
More straight talk in 2014…
Happy New Year! Full of idealistic resolutions about gym membership and drastic dietary upheaval, last night I settled into the seasonal gloom to watch the opening episode of a boxed Blu-ray set given to me for Christmas. And I found an interesting message for anyone interested in programming. The show, written by the US team […]
Like it or not…
After reading an article in the FT´s magazine about typography fonts and how critical they are to communications between the ultra-cool (”I would never date a girl who used Times Roman” says a shocked young IT blood) I realise that from now on any blog worth its consonants simply must be written in Helvetica Neue. […]
A weekend in Scotland with Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra and a visit to the Scottish Opera
It was great to be in the Usher Hall, Edinburgh on Thursday to hear the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra at the start of their UK tour. And what a concert! Delius, Grieg – with a poised and powerful performance of the piano concerto by Christian Idle Hadland – and a storming account of Strauss´s Ein Heldenleben. […]
