Martin Bakari News

Cincinnati Opera kicks off its 99th Summer Festival on Sunday, June 9 with a free concert in Washington Park. Opera in the Park will feature a selection of unforgettable opera and musical theater favorites-from 'Summertime' from Porgy and Bess to Man of La Mancha's 'The Impossible Dream'-performed by stars from the 2019 season, the Cincinnati Opera Chorus, and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.

The Atlanta Opera broke new records this season. Even before its final presentation Francesca Zambello's new take on La traviata, which closed this past weekend 2018-19 was already guaranteed to be the company's highest-grossing season of the past decade, highlighted by last fall's West Side Story, the highest-selling production in the Atlanta Opera's 39-year history (Opera News).

With a mix of new and traditional takes on opera, Seattle Opera unveils a 2019/20 Season that offers something for everyone. Audiences will experience new-to-Seattle productions of Rigoletto, Cinderella, and Eugene Onegin; the company premiere of Charlie Parker's Yardbird; and the return of a beloved classic, La boh me.

"The mystery of love is greater than the mystery of death." So said Oscar Wilde's Salome, anticipating the theme running through all six of the works that make up The Atlanta Opera's 2018-19 season. The six are linked also by their novelty, for under the leadership of Carl W. Knobloch, Jr. General & Artistic Director Tomer Zvulun, Atlanta's new season consists entirely of stagings conceived over the past few years. Created in collaboration with leading opera companies from around the world, four are ambitious mainstage productions: the blockbuster musical West Side Story, 19th-century classics Eugene Onegin and La traviata, and the Southeast premiere of Dead Man Walking, a major 21st-century addition to the canon. Rounding out the season, Charlie Parker's Yardbird and Maria de Buenos Aires will be presented in the Discoveries series, which breaks down barriers between artists and their audience by providing authentic, intimate and immersive experiences in nontraditional spaces. The winner of a "Best of Atlanta" award from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and an International Opera Award nomination, the series represents one of the many innovations behind the company's current wave of extraordinary creative and economic resurgence.

The Atlanta Opera opens its 2018-19 season with the Southeastern debut of Charlie Parker's YARDBIRD, a new opera about the legendary saxophonist and jazz pioneer.

Fort Worth Opera (FWOpera) announced today the casts and creative teams for the 2019 Festival season, including the world premiere of composer-librettist Rachel J. Peters's delightfully wicked opera, Companionship. Adapted from the short story by internationally bestselling author Arthur Phillips, this delicious dark comedy about an obsession with dough, mirrors our modern world, where what we consume becomes all-consuming. Selected as a winner of the 2018 FWOpera Frontiers showcase, the work will receive a fully staged production next spring at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden, as part of FWOpera's alternative venue series, Opera Unbound.

When you think of the song, 'Summertime,' perhaps you hear the elegant Ella Fitzgerald-or the earthy Janis Joplin-singing in your mind. But, while many great covers exist, there's nothing like experiencing the song where 'fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high,' as Gershwin first wrote it: for the powerful voice of an opera singer.

Portland Opera is pleased to announce programming for the company's 55th season, scheduled to begin in November 2018. The season will launch with the recently announced "November classic" - Verdi's heartbreaking romance La Traviata - bringing opera back to Portland in the fall months. In March, Portland Opera will present Laura Kaminsky's brave and beautiful coming-of-age story, As One, where two voices, a mezzo-soprano and a baritone, share the role of the transgender heroine Hannah. The season will continue in the spring with the company's annual Big Night concert and a bright and vibrant production of Rossini's great Il Barbiere di Siviglia. In July, the company will present Mozart's La Finta Giardiniera for the first time, followed by the company premiere of Philip Glass's exploration of the nature of justice, In the Penal Colony, based on Franz Kafka's short story.

The winners of the 47th annual George London Foundation Awards Competition for young American and Canadian opera singers were announced at the conclusion of the competition's final round this evening, which took place before an enthusiastic audience at Gilder Lehrman Hall at The Morgan Library & Museum in New York City.

Known for pioneering rare and captivating site-specific performances, On Site Opera (OSO) will produce the New York premiere (and the first production since its world premiere) of Ricky Ian Gordon's Morning Star on March 21-22, and 25, 2018, at the Eldridge Street Synagogue, in partnership with the Museum at Eldridge Street.

Portland Opera will present the West Coast premiere of a double bill of two contemporary works, The Difficulty of Crossing a Field and Pulitzer Prize-winning The Little Match Girl Passion on July 28 - the first of four performances.

 On March 31 and April 1 at 7:30 PM “The Long Walk” will make its Western U.S. premiere at the Jeanné Wagner Theater in the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center. It is the story of one man's experience and based on the book “The Long Walk: A Story of War and the Life that Follows” by Brian Castner.

 Visual artist Chris Larson and composer Anthony Gatto join forces to bring the darkly humorous world of Flannery O'Connor's WISE BLOOD to life. Set in The Soap Factory, the post-industrial beauty of a 130-year-old factory turned art gallery, this wild and immersive opera-exhibition takes the audience on an intimate journey alongside the oftentimes eccentric and always captivating characters of this Southern Gothic tale. In this promenade style performance, audience is guided with the characters directly into, around, and through the galleries that feature large scale installation pieces, kinetic sculptures, and live music.

Portland Ovations, in collaboration with the USM School of Music and American Opera Projects, Brooklyn, NY, presents the world premiere of The Summer King, an Opera on the Life of Josh Gibson, at Merrill Auditorium on Thursday, May 8th at 7:30 pm. The Summer King, composed by Portland resident Daniel Sonenberg, features a talented cast known for their performances around the world. The May 8th concert, an Ovations commission, is The Summer King's world premiere.

The Boston University College of Fine Arts returns to New York for the fourth installment of its InCite Arts Festival, themed 'The Power of Art.' The festival runs March 10 - 14 at venues throughout Manhattan and features students, faculty, alumni and friends of the College's Schools of Music, Theatre, and Visual Arts. For information, visit http://www.bu.edu/cfa/incite or call 617-353-3350.