55 stories by "Arthur Kaptainis"
Newcomers and return customers alike will not regret their investment
Often it is possible to say of a COC production that the music prevails but in this case the stagecraft proves damnably difficult to edit out.
Atom Egoyan was sharing in the acclaim of a hugely successful revival of the Canadian Opera Company production of Wagner's Die Walküre Saturday night in Toronto
Mozart's Don Giovanni is one of the most messed-around-with operas in the standard repertoire. And the COC's latest production is no exception
The people at the Toronto Symphony Orchestra have reasoned for years that Mozart is what we need in bitter mid-January
Yes, Virginia, there is an opera called William Tell attached to the overture we love so well
The Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio is almost literally a troupe of young singers waiting in the wings, appreciated in principle for their hard work in supporting roles but only occas…
Like most Catholics and most Victorians, Edward Elgar regarded death as a doorway rather than a terminus
Not a night of bel canto. Verismo? Yes, especially after intermission. And Puccini throughout, which of course has everything to do with the indestructability of Madama Butterfly
Don Quixote the literary classic runs over 900 pages. Don Quichotte the opera gets you out of the Four Seasons Centre in less than two and a half hours. There is some abridgement
Bless Queen Bess. A formidable and long-serving monarch, she set high standards of shrewdness and inspired many first-rate fictional treatments
Alas, poor Hercules. Neither opera nor oratorio, fish nor fowl. Styled a "musical drama" by Handel and his librettist, this English-language work of 1745 is not an easy thing to stage, yet t…
It is well known that Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera ran afoul of the censors on account of its frank depiction of regicide in the Swedish cour
It was not a bad night for the ears
With good sounds emanating from the pit and a podium approach that mixed momentum and lushness, this La Bohème can be approached with cautious optimism
Will there be a Britten switcheroo? The Canadian Opera Company flew in Anthony Dean Griffey, a noted American tenor, for the dress rehearsal of Peter Grimes on Wednesday night, with Ben Hepp…
Last season the company announced its net ticket revenue at $10.9-million. In the 2012-13 report this number is $9.9-million
François Girard and Michael Levine collaborating on a new Parsifal? Considering what these Canadians have done for Wagner in the past, I was expecting people to boo before the curtain wen…
Why were people laughing and clapping in the Four Seasons Centre rather than glumly having their expectations thwarted?
Mutter has blended star appeal throughout her career with dedication to contemporary music.
Hard to take seriously as a story but even harder not to like as a score, Il Trovatore is probably the least-performed of Verdi's mid-period hits.
Showpiece overload: It is recurring syndrome in National Youth Orchestra tour programs. Not that these concerts (including the Toronto stop on Tuesday, presented by Toronto Summer Music) are…
My reading is this: When Neef got an offer from a European company, he board promptly panicked and handed him the keys.
MUNICH — Okay, freunds and fräuleins, shall we call it ge-done? Wagner's Ring, four operas in six nights, though not in the right order, and delivered by three Brünnhildes, three Wot…
The people at the TSO say it ain't so. The run this week of the Last Night of the Proms at Roy Thomson Hall did not necessarily represent cheerio for this long-running exercise in high-spiri…
