Review: The Peculiar Grace of Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones at Lyric Opera
My first opera was at age 10 when our parish priest took us to see La Boheme at the Lyric Opera House. I always thought that opera was sung in […]
Review: Love Hurts So Good in Lyric’s Tosca
The voices! Soprano Michelle Bradley, making her Lyric Opera of Chicago debut in the title role of Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca, and tenor Russell Thomas as her doomed lover Cavaradossi filled […]
Review: Lyric Opera’s The Magic Flute Is a Contemporary, Inventive Adaptation That Lets the Music Shine
The Magic Flute, a German opera by Mozart, first premiered in Vienna in 1791; Mozart himself conducted the orchestra that night. In the more than 200 years since, the show […]
Review: Opera and Nas Mix with Hearing in Color’sUndying Love
Hearing in Color, a Fractured Atlas organization in collaboration with WFMT 98.7 FM, presented the chamber opera Undying Love on November 12, at the warm, welcoming Kehrein Center for the […]
Review: Lyric Uncorks the Charm with The Elixir of Love
The two works that began Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 2021-22 season could hardly contrast more. The first opening, on September 17, was Giuseppe Verdi’s Macbeth: Dark, brutal, gory, filled with lust for power, rage […]
Review: Lyric’s Macbeth Delivers the Sound and Fury in Return to Live Performance
Lyric Opera of Chicago opened its 2021-22 comeback season September 17 with Giuseppe Verdi’s 1847 interpretation of William Shakespeare’s 1606 play Macbeth. There have been few works of literature more […]
Review: NU’s Virtual Opera Orfeo, Tie-Dyed-in-the-Wool Creativity
A young student approaches Northwestern University’s arts center at the beginning of Orfeo Remote, a thoroughly modernized, virtual interpretation of the historic Claudio Monteverdi opera L’Orfeo. Finding the doors locked […]
Review: Lyric’s The Queen of Spades, Tchaikovsky’s Punk Rock Opera
There are performances that play exactly to your sensibilities and provide you with thorough delight. There are others that may challenge your tastes but leave you thinking, “Well, that was […]
Review: Lyric Opera Revisits a Timeless, Thrilling Classic in Madama Butterfly
The Lyric Opera of Chicago first presented Puccini’s Madama Butterfly in 1955 (it made its world premiere in 1904); the version on stage there now (through March 8) is a revival […]
Review: Fall in Love in Italy This Holiday with The Light in the Piazza at Lyric Opera
“Mother, what happened here?” The innocent question that opens The Light in the Piazza has a loaded answer. Clara Johnson (Solea Pfeiffer) and her mother Margaret (Renée Fleming) step into […]
The Lyric’s Don Giovanni Turns the Table on Opera’s Most Infamous Sex Abuser
It may seem odd that Don Giovanni, the opera premiered by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1787, has taken on new social relevance more than 230 years later. But the recently […]
Review: Go Figaro—The Lyric’s Barber Styles a Light, Bright Opening Night
The Lyric Opera of Chicago will have plenty for those who like their operas dark and deep and full of danger. The season that opened Saturday night (September 28) will […]