Yesterday  (July 11 2013), I spent a lovely afternoon at the invitation of the local Wagner Society here in Santa Fe as they paid tribute, via slightly belated birthday party, to a long-time Patron of the Arts.  Edgar Foster Daniels has been supporting the arts (with opera being his particular primary interest) for decades.  He […]

With much media attention, but little celebrated fanfare; the dedicated and hard-working Metropolitan Opera stage crew reportedly disassembled and loaded for transport perhaps the most talked about set in Met history:  “The Machine”.  Its 24 articulating half-diamond shaped planks are to be housed in a warehouse somewhere in upstate New York for an indefinite period […]

March 7-10, 2013 will most certainly go down as a transformative and transitional year for the Vann Vocal Institute in Montgomery, Alabama.  As many now know, my connection to the Capital City goes back some 20 years.  Established in 2007 via gift/bequest from the late Roy D. Vann, the Vann Vocal Institute was created to […]

Winters in the snow belt of Cleveland, Ohio were brutally cold in the 1970’s.  They were endless, withering, and dumped several feet of snow on the ground due to the dreaded “lake-effect” conditions that haunted cities and towns that were perched along the wide, open swath of Lake Erie. At one point, the Parma City […]

On Facebook and Twitter this morning, I posted that second performances are akin to “Low Sunday” in the Catholic Church. That is to say, a letdown compared to all the festivities and poignant lead up to Easter Sunday; or in a way the opening of a new opera production. Now…in no way, shape, or form […]

I am quite often asked by friends and relatives who are not in the performing arts about the process of getting a production to stage.  After all, they are the ones who only see the “final, shiny, right off the assembly line, fresh from the show-room” product that is sure to dazzle.  There is, as […]

Before having dinner with a friend last night (August 22, 2012), he handed me a copy of the August issue of Opera News. While he knows that I am not a voracious reader of most industry publications, he said “A lot of your friends are in this issue; just glance through it.”  Well, glance through […]

As the city of Cincinnati continues its incredible renaissance by reclaiming historic neighborhoods, redeveloping long neglected public lands, and renovating the most spectacular collection of Italianate architecture ever seen in the United States, one was struck this past week by the presence of thousands of visitors, and hundreds of choirs, as the city hosted the […]