March Issue of Limelight: Emma Matthews does Mozart
Australia’s leading coloratura talks about her new Mozart CD and how she gets to the top (and stays there).
Clive Paget is a former Limelight Editor, now Editor-at-Large, and a tour leader for Limelight Arts Travel. Based in London after three years in New York, he writes for The Guardian, BBC Music Magazine, Gramophone, Musical America and Opera News. Before moving to Australia, he directed and developed new musical theatre for London’s National Theatre.
Australia’s leading coloratura talks about her new Mozart CD and how she gets to the top (and stays there).
The Wagnerian soprano who thought she'd never sing again is looking at a fuller diary than ever.
A cracking inaugural concert gives the Robertson era the look of a potential age of gold. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
Deadpan Shakespeare, Russian-style, makes for an evening of divine mayhem and madness.
From interactive iPads to magical encounters on the mean streets of Perth, it’s comfortable shoes time at the Festival. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
Reconciliation seems a distant dream play as Strindberg’s relocated classic reopens old wounds.
Canberra and Willoughby Symphony chief spreads his wings and expands his interests abroad. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
Handa Opera on the Harbour, the Melbourne Ring and Stuart Skelton all make this year’s nominations. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
High-octane storytelling and a Dancing with the Stars moment make for a memorable night of Israeli dance.
Hungarian composer Peter Eötvös has plenty of operatic experience having produced versions of Angels in America and Chekov’s Three Sisters. His 2008 setting of a short story by Gabriel Garcia Márquez, then, might seem to promise more, but despite this excellent Glyndebourne cast recording giving it every opportunity to land, it remains peculiarly elusive and, for all it’s South American colour, a slightly drab affair. The story concerns the increasingly obsessive love of a priest for a 12-year-old girl suspected of contracting rabies after being bitten by a dog. Oddly, her age appears not to be an issue here, and sung by the capable Allison Bell, she simply comes across as a young woman – albeit one given to a good old scream now and again. There’s a greater tension between the world of the local ‘natives’, accused by the Catholic hierarchy of superstition, and the harsh attempts by the Bishop and Abbess to exorcise Sierva’s ‘demon’. Perhaps the problem is that the short story is just that – short. The characters lack background and relationships are sketchy. The libretto is skillfully adapted, but too often the score seems to drift along when it should seize the dramatic possibilities. Many…
Otello on an aircraft carrier sails on a sea of orchestral pleasures if short of a proper captain at the helm.
Takashi Niigaki composed his music for 20 years and says Mamoru Samuragochi isn’t even deaf. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
Mamoru Samuragochi, dubbed the Japanese Beethoven, admits paying another composer. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in