Following up on last year’s announcement:
“James Levine is making a comeback.”
“Defying opera world doubters who thought he was too ill, weak or disengaged, the longtime and much loved music director of the Metropolitan Opera plans to return to the podium for the first time in two years, for a May 19 performance by the Met Orchestra at Carnegie Hall and for three productions at the opera house next season.”
Read more about this at Arts Beat, The New York Times Arts section.
Reviewed by Tony Villecco
I attended my first live-from-the-Metropolitan Opera, HD, big-screen production last Saturday (Dect. 10). One has to applaud the Met’s foresight to bring opera to the masses this way, up-close and personal and far more reasonably priced than an orchestra seat. Gounod’s Faust opened the Metropolitan back in 1883. This latest production was, overall, a fine one with some excellent singing– despite the director Des McAnuff’s decision to transplant the opera to the 20th Century, between the world wars. Read the rest of this entry »
“James Levine, the Metropolitan Opera’s ailing music director, has withdrawn from conducting at the house this season and the next, the Met and Mr. Levine said on Friday (Dec. 9). Levine cancelled the last remaining dates on his schedule — two cycles of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen in April and May — and withdrew from all productions he had planned to lead next season.”
Read more about this at Arts Beat, The New York Times Arts section.
Here’s a link to The New York Times’ article about Metropolitan Opera finances and fund-raising: http://tinyurl.com/3tdj55d.
Believe it or not, the Metropolitan Opera had never mounted a production of Donizetti’s “Anna Bolena” before this season. The opera — and the Met’s 2011-12 season — debuted Monday (Sept. 26); here’s a link to The New York Times review: http://tinyurl.com/4xcevxa.
The New York Times today (Sept. 6) is reporting that James Levine, the Metropolitan Opera’s music director, has withdrawn from all performances at the Met for the rest of the year after falling while on vacation in Vermont and damaging a vertebra. The injury, which required emergency surgery, comes on top of a series of back operations followed by periods of rehabilitation to correct a painful spinal condition called stenosis.
While the Met saidLevine would remain music director, it immediately elevated its principal guest conductor, Fabio Luisi, to the title of principal conductor and handed over to him most of Levine’s fall conducting assignments.
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Barb Van Atta
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