James Conlon extends contract to be Music Director of LA Opera until 2018

February 20, 2013 Leave a comment

At the end of my review of last year’s production of Albert Herring, I wrote this about James Conlon:  ”Long may he reign at Los Angeles Opera.”

It looks like I’ll get my wish — at least for another five years.

The company just announced that Mr. Conlon has extended his contract as LA Opera’s Music Director through the end of the 2017/2018 season (full press release below after the jump).  Plácido Domingo, the company’s General Director, says this:  “James has had an incredible impact on the artistic quality of LA Opera performances.”

Damn straight.

His impact on the quality of LA Opera has been so good that among certain circles, there was speculation (read: fear) that the native New Yorker would get wooed away to take over the mighty Metropolitan Opera after James Levine was forced to give up the bulk of conducting duties there due to health reasons.

Serious hints that Mr. Conlon would stay in Southern California came up during the season opening press conference this past September when he said, “Los Angeles is one of the greatest places to be, to live, and to make music.”  Today’s announcement makes it clear that those comments were more than just lip service.

This news undoubtably bodes well for Los Angeles Opera’s future.  After suffering through some rather lean years, the company seems to be on the cusp of returning to the level of artistic prominence (some may add “relevance”) that it had during the middle part of the last decade.  I can’t imagine that a conductor of Mr. Conlon’s stature would stick around if he didn’t think — nay, know — that things will be better very soon.

There should be much rejoicing in Southern California musical and cultural circles tonight.

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LA Opera announces 2013/2014 season

January 8, 2013 Leave a comment

Billy Budd at LA Opera (2000 production)
Los Angeles Opera announced their 2013/2014 season today.  As far as I’m concerned, the most noteworthy things:

  • Not a big increase in number of productions and performances versus the 2012/2013 season, but the mix is a bit more diverse — including three performances of Glass’s Einstein on the Beach.
  • Tenor Brandon Jovanovich returns to L.A. this fall as Don Jose in Carmen
  • Nino Machaidze appears twice (Carmen and Thaïs)
  • Plácido Domingo won’t be singing until late in the season (May-June 2014) when he takes on another baritone role, Athanaël in Thaïs; he’ll be seen at the beginning of the season conducting four performances of Carmen
  • Grant Gershon conducts the three remaining performances of Carmen
  • Music Director James Conlon will be conducting the vast majority of the performances throughout the season (thank goodness).
  • The only conductor appearing this season who does not hold some kind of title with the company will be Massenet specialist Patrick Fournillier in, appropriately enough, Massenet’s Thaïs
  • The company will celebrate the Britten centenary with a production of Billy Budd featuring Liam Bonner (last seen around here in Albert Herring in Spring of 2012) in the title role and will play a major role in “Britten 100/LA: A Centenary Celebration,” a county-wide celebration.
  • No Wagner opera this year.  The only opera to be sung in German will be The Magic Flute in the company’s well-known production by Sir Peter Hall and Gerald Scarfe.  The cast includes Janai Brugger (recently seen locally as Musetta in La Bohème) and, making her company debut, Erika Miklósa as Queen of the Night (click HERE to see a video of her singing the Queen of the Night’s big aria)
  • The company will make two visits to Orange County for one concert performance each of Falstaff and Thaïs
  • Mr. Conlon will conduct two performances of the world premiere of Alexander Prior’s Jonah and the Whale,  inspired by Britten’s Noye’s Fludde
  • Dmitri Hvorostovsky appears in recital and Audra McDonald performs a one-night concert

The short version of the schedule (all performances at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion unless otherwise noted):

  • Carmen (Bizet):  Seven performances, Sep. 21 ̵ Oct. 6, 2013
  • Einstein on the Beach (Glass):  Three performances, October 11, 12 and 13, 2013
  • Audra McDonald in Concert:  October 26, 2013
  • Falstaff (Verdi):  Six performances, Nov. 9 ̵ Dec. 1, 2013; ; additionally, there will be one concert performance in Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa on Nov 26, 2013
  • Billy Budd (Britten):  Six performances, Feb. 22 – March 16, 2014
  • Lucia di Lammermoor (Donizetti):  Six performances, March 15 – April 6, 2014
  • Jonah and the Whale (Alexander Prior):  Two performances at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, March 21-22, 2014 (World Premiere)
  • Thaïs (Massenet):  Six performances, May 17 – June 7, 2014; additionally, there will be one concert performance in Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa on May 22, 2014
  • Dmitri Hvorostovsky in Recital:  May 22, 2014

Complete details taken from the official Los Angeles Opera press release are below:

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An old-school Don Giovanni: Ildebrando D’Arcangelo stars in LA Opera’s latest production

September 22, 2012 3 Comments

Last May, the Los Angeles Philharmonic presented Don Giovanni with a vocally and visually strong baritone leading a solid cast in a thoroughly avant-garde production.  Beginning tonight, Los Angeles Opera presents the same opera, with another hunky baritone leading a another solid cast, this time in an unapologetically traditional production.

Judging by Wednesday’s final dress rehearsal at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion (*see caveat below), L.A. audiences probably could not have asked for two more completely different and yet equally valid interpretations of Mozart’s great work within a couple years of each other, yet here they were mere months apart.  For those who were turned off by the stylized psycho-sexual machinations at Disney Hall earlier this year, this old-school rendition will be most welcome.

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A peek behind the scenes of LA Opera’s glamorous opening night of “I Due Foscari”

September 15, 2012 1 Comment

Here are some pictures from me and others from last night’s season opening performance of Verdi’s I Due Foscari (The Two Foscari) at Los Angeles Opera starring Plácido Domingo.

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“The Doge of Los Angeles:” Plácido Domingo is feted at LA Opera presser

September 8, 2012 3 Comments

Wednesday’s Los Angeles Opera press conference centered around celebrating Plácido Domingo.  Board members and politicians were on hand to offer their praises, stories, and tokens of appreciation to the organization’s General Director and probably the world’s most famous living opera singer.  The reason for this latest round of adulation?  Three things:

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The future looks bright: Los Angeles Children’s Chorus and American Youth Symphony at Walt Disney Concert Hall

March 6, 2012 1 Comment

The fact that the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus (LACC) is excellent should not be news.  They’ve had many opportunities to impress when performing with the likes of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, most recently as part of the massive choir for Mahler’s Eighth Symphony.  That said, they don’t usually get a chance to show off on their own terms.  Sunday night at Walt Disney Concert Hall, show off they did, and then some.

In conjunction with the American Youth Symphony (AYS), they performed a Shakespeare-themed program as part of the LA Phil’s “Sounds About Town” series.  The highlight of the night proved to be  Daníel Bjarnason’s The isle is full of noises, a three-movement work based on The Tempest co-commissioned by the LACC and AYS.  James Conlon was on hand to conduct the new work, adding an even greater sense of importance to the night.

Daníel Bjarnason

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LA Opera’s Albert Herring is a light-hearted king of a comedy

February 25, 2012 Leave a comment

Sid (Liam Bonner) and Albert (Alek Shrader) taking in an eyeful of Nancy (Daniela Mack)

Quick — imagine an opera, any opera, in your head.  I’ll wait. . . . I’m guessing that you probably came up with large-bodied singers standing in one place belting out big arias in a foreign language (probably Italian, German, or French) over the strains of a big orchestra; lots of murder, suicide, rape, and other unpleasantries, with at least one character taking a full act or two to actually  go through the dying process; random deities, the supernatural, and a whole host of unrealistic events are typical; and almost always, the more you know before you step foot in the opera house, the more you’ll enjoy and the better off you are (ugh, homework).  It is big and can be intimidating.  Sound familiar?

Albert Herring is NOT that kind of opera.  Benjamin Britten’s lone comedy is a human-scaled, English-language bit of theatre which, in Los Angeles Opera’s production that opens tonight, proves to be a thoroughly approachable experience.  There is very much to admire and enjoy, regardless of whether one is an operatic veteran or novice.

Most of all, it’s funny.  Truly funny, with that special brand of wry humor the British seem to possess in droves.  In this case, the shy, unassuming Albert is unexpectedly chosen as May Day Festival king when it is decided that the girls of the town are a little too, um, worldly (nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more).  ”Want virgins, not trollops!” declares Loxford grande dame, Lady Billows (don’t we all).  Then someone decides to spike King Albert’s May Day punch, he sows his proverbial wild oats, and the rest is comic history.

Once again, I was asked to occupy one of the LA Opera’s “tweet seats” at their final dress rehearsal, and as such, was highly encouraged to share my thoughts on the whole experience.  I’ll post about the night’s tweet seat particulars later, but for now, a review of the performance:

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Yuja Wang and James Conlon triumph with the LA Phil

November 9, 2011 2 Comments

Yuja Wang is the real deal.

If there was any doubt that might have crept in as to whether or not she was a “serious” pianist and/or musician based on a spate of recent cancellations and a critic’s unfortunate comments about her attire at the Hollywood Bowl, let them be put to rest after this past weekend’s concerts at Walt Disney Concert Hall.  On Sunday afternoon, she was spectacular in Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto, aided strongly by James Conlon and the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

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