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Postcard from Noto
Noto is a hill town some 30 km south of Syracuse. While most towns in the environs show a strong Greek influence - the magnificent cathedral in Syracuse itself is a converted temple to Athene - Noto...
View ArticleBremner, Offenbach and Bernstein
Yesterday's The Times contained a long piece by Rory Bremner on the subject of his forthcoming translation of Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld. I'm a great admirer of Rory: he's extremely funny as...
View ArticleMusic by the canals in Gent
Take a swift forty minute train ride from Brussels and you arrive in the East Flanders city of Gent. You're firmly in Dutch speaking territory here, and Gent has much of the feel of Amsterdam: tall...
View ArticleWarning for Met Player users
As will have been obvious if you read these pages, we've been strong supporters of Met Player: I've written various editorials items about them and we've had a commercial relationship (recently...
View ArticleHow long does it take to write an opera?
It was great to hear nice things being said about the Cultural Olympiad on Radio 4 a few minutes ago. But I was quite taken aback by a comment from Michael Berkeley. While broadly supportive of the...
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Interview: author Gale Martin
.question{font-weight:bold;}Gale Martin writes the well-loved opera blog Operatoonity, as well as writing opera reviews for Bachtrack. Her first novel, Don Juan in Hankey is a rapid-fire comedy set...
View ArticleMy operatic round-up of 2011
So that's it, folks, for an epic year of opera-going. I've been to 42 operas (44 if you count Il Trittico as three), all but five of them in London, and looking through the list makes me realise what a...
View ArticlePostcard from Gstaad
Since childhood, my three most enduring passions have been music, skiing and food. So when the organiser of Sommets Musicaux de Gstaad, Thierry Scherz, asked me to spend a few days reviewing the...
View ArticlePostcard from Bayreuth
On a first visit to Bayreuth, there are some things that one expects, of course: the beautiful opera house set in its park high on a hill above the city, the unique acoustic of its sunken, invisible...
View ArticleOn Wagner and Nazism
With Wagner’s anniversary year in full swing, Der Spiegel published a long article by Dirk Kurbjuweit on the sensitivities caused by Wagner’s association with Hitler’s politics, which they helpfully...
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