Wuorinen’s Brokeback Mountain returns home to NYCO

By Edward Sava-Segal, 04 June 2018

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Reviewed at Jazz at Lincoln Center: Rose Theater, New York City on 2 June 2018

Wuorinen, Brokeback Mountain

New York City Opera

Kazem Abdullah, Conductor

Jacopo Spirei, Director

Eva Musil, Set Designer, Costume Designer

Glen Seven Allen, Jack

Heather Buck, Alma

Hilary Ginther, Lureen

Daniel Okulitch, Ennis

Jenni Bank, Jack's mother

Brian Kontes, Hogboy

Christopher Job, Aguirre

Exciting, loud Fanciulla opens NYCO season

Robert Levine, 6th September

Whenever a relative opera novice or occasional toe-dipper tells me how he or she cried at the end of La bohème, I want to send them to La fanciulla del West. Of course I choke up at the end of Bohème – who doesn't? – but for a good bawling session, the fabulously maudlin finale of Fanciulla is the place to be. The plot doesn't bode well.

****1

Fallujah brings the Iraq War to the opera stage

Thomas May, 18th November

Fallujah, a chamber opera exploring the Iraq War and post-traumatic stress disorder, makes a powerful impression in its East Coast première.

****1

An auspicious season opener for NYCO

Edward Sava-Segal, 8th September

A rare pairing of Rachmaninov's Aleko and Leoncavallo's Pagliacci was the first première of the New York City Opera's 2016-2017 season.

***11

NYCO presents New York première of Florencia en el Amazonas

Rebecca Lentjes, 22nd June

Musically inoffensive, the soaring Romanticism further makes sense given the story, in which a cast of García-Márquezian characters float down the Amazon River on a steamboat rife with passion and yearning.

***11

Boob jobs and blowjobs at BAM: Anna Nicole, the opera

Rebecca Lentjes, 17th September

During the opening night of Anna Nicole at BAM, I found myself experiencing a case of déjà vu. New York City Opera was electrifying the Howard Gilman Opera House with a work by a living composer featuring the salacious story of a female protagonist whose life was splashed across tabloids, and at one point even featuring an act of fellatio with the disjointed music carrying on in the background.

****1

New York City Opera closes season with Alden's riotous La Périchole

Zerbinetta, 21st April

Henri Bergson famously defined comedy as “something mechanical encrusted on the living”. One suspects that Jacques Offenbach would have been a fan of this definition, and that Christopher Alden most certainly is.

****1

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Edward Sava-Segal

Edward has been living in New York for the last 25 years, one of the reasons being the extraordinarily rich cultural life in this city. He has studied piano and classical music in his early years. He switched later on to computer science and data architecture but he kept an unwavering interest in following the classical music phenomenon here in New York and in his travels. Edward occasionally reviews fine arts events for the most prestigious literary magazine in Romania, his home country.