David Bonetti
Bio:
David covers fine arts and opera. He was a staff writer for the Saint Louis Post Dispatch and before that the San Francisco Examiner and Boston Phoenix. Now retired he has returned to Boston
Recent Articles:
-
Die Tote Stadt (The Dead City) Music
Boston Premiere for Korngold Rarity
By: - Sep 16th, 2014Best known for his film scores, Erich Wolfgang Korngold was a child prodigy in Vienna. "Die tote Stadt" is his operatic masterpiece. Long ignored, it is increasingly being performed internationally.
-
The Bartered Bride Boston Midsummer Opera Music
Rare Performance of Czech Opera
By: - Jul 27th, 2014A smart production featuring talented young singers proves a delight for art-starved local summer audiences. Spoiler alert: the young woman who would be bartered ends up with the man she loves.
-
Odyssey Opera Inaugurates June Opera Festival Music
Three Italian Rarities, Including Verdi's First Comdy
By: - Jun 16th, 2014Odyssey Opera is devoted to taking its audience on a journey "through the lesser known reaches of the opera world." On paper, it was an enticing idea. I could hardly wait. And in execution, it turned out to be a promising start of what one hopes is a long-lived local company.
-
Dmitri Hvorostovsky Sings Russian Songs Music
Russian Baritone Electrifies Jordan Hall Audience
By: - Jun 02nd, 2014Hvorostovsky plumbs every shade of melancholy in his sets of songs by Tchaikovsky, Medtner and Rachmaninoff. There is no classical song literature more soulful than the Russian.
-
Mark Morris Dancers Acis and Galatea Dance
Nymphs and Shepherds Frolic at Boston's Shubert Theatre
By: - May 18th, 2014Nobody can set Baroque opera to dance better than Mark Morris, but his latest effort, a joyful Handel opera, often seemed dialed-in. Still, it was Mark Morris and it was filled with delights.
-
I Puritani at Boston Lyric Opera Music
Bel Canto Masterpiece Features Two Mad Scenes.
By: - May 05th, 2014BLO production got most of it right, although director Crystal Manich, fooled with the ending. But singing didn't soar, leaving the audience with dry eyes at the end of evening.
-
Deborah Voigt Sings at Symphony Hall Music
Program Highlights Her Vocal Strengths
By: - May 02nd, 2014Deborah Voigt has spoken frankly about cutting back on her opera performances. A set of Strauss songs showed how great she could be in that repertoire. A set of American art songs suggest her new direction.
-
Deborah Voigt Sings at Symphony Hall Music
Song Recital features Strauss and Tchaikovsky
By: - Apr 29th, 2014Voigt scaled her huge voice down for the intimacy of the song, but let it soar at the conclusion of a Strauss favorite
-
Boston Baroque Does Monteverdi Rarity Music
Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria
By: - Apr 28th, 2014Left only in a production book, Monteverdi masterpiece must be recreated for performance. Boston Baroque's Martin Pearlman and his superb production team and cast of singers and instrumentalists made it a vibrant experience. Pearlman gets more credit for “Ulisse†than he might for his many other triumphs as company founder, director and conductor because he helped, in a way, to compose it.
-
Nadine Sierra Triumphs with Boston Lyric Music
Verdi Masterpiece Stylishly but Traditionally Staged
By: - Mar 19th, 2014One of the Boston Lyric Opera's most successful recent productions, "Rigoletto" is an unabashed melodrama but its dramatic truths are relevant to a day when the powerful and corrupt can get their way no matter what.
-
Natalie Dessay Sings French at Jordan Hall Music
Opera Diva Featured Elegant Songs of Love
By: - Mar 13th, 2014Natalie Dessay has been one of the most electrifying singer/actresses on the opera stage for nearly 30 years. Now, she is focusing her career on pop songs and the classic song literature. Dessay assembled a primarily French program with enough German songs to give the evening some weight.
-
An Incandescent Salome at BSO Music
Andris Nelsons Knows His Way Around Opera
By: - Mar 11th, 2014A top-tier cast tears the top off Symphony Hall in Richard Strauss's decadent take on the dysfunctional family with a religious prophet thrown in for good measure. The orchestra is enormous: 32 violins, a dozen violas, ten cellos, eight double basses and it seemed like every woodwind and brass player in the greater Boston area. And that doesn’t even account for the harps, tambourine, xylophone, harmonium, gong, kettledrum, timpani, castanet, triangle, glockenspiel and celesta. Andris Nelsons, the BSO director designate, kept them all in control.
-
Student Opera Offers Deep Satisfactions Music
Boston's Opera Stars of Tomorrow
By: - Mar 01st, 2014In Boston, the two music conservatories and the Boston University Opera Institute offer a mix of warhorses and rarities with young singers variously ready for the next step. Often student performances are frustratingly uneven with various degrees of accomplishment on display, but sometimes they come together with well-balanced casts, offering the experience of professional opera at a quarter the price.
-
Amanda Forsythe Keeps The Garland Fresh Music
Boston Baroque Presents Rameau's Rarity.
By: - Feb 18th, 2014Jean-Philippe Rameau's one-act opera "La Guirlande" might seem to be a frivolous pastoral, but he brings it to life with rich and subtly detailed music. The afternoon belonged to Amanda Forsythe. She is as fine an actress as singer, imbuing everything with the force of life. Where other singers make you aware of the effort expended to hit high notes (or low), Forsythe makes it all sound easy. She moves without break through the vocal registers that loom as roadblocks to other singers.
-
Sondheim's A Little Night Music Music
I Could Have Waltzed All Afternoon at Emmanuel Music
By: - Jan 22nd, 2014Emmanuel Music's semi-staged performance of Stephen Sondheim's "A Little Night Music" demonstrated to me that the Broadway musical has its merits. I had expected that whatever the quality of the performance I would be writing a review mourning Emmanuel Music’s decline from pursuing high seriousness in music to reveling in kitsch. How could I have been so wrong for so long?
-
Boston Baroque's Messiah Music
Historically Informed Performance
By: - Dec 16th, 2013"Messiah" might be a Christmas cliche, but Martin Pearlman and his Boston Baroque keep it light and fleet. The chorus was superb, composed of individuals who could sing in unison, but who were also able to break out of the group with their individual voices. I don’t recall ever hearing a chorus with so many distinct individuals.
-
Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Operas Music
The BEMF Delighted Jordan Hall Audience
By: - Dec 03rd, 2013The BEMF has produced five semi-stage chamber operas since 2008 and this Thanksgiving weekend presented excerpts from all five.
-
Lizzie Borden's Forty Whacks Music
Boston Lyric Opera Slated for Tanglewood
By: - Nov 25th, 2013Although its mid-century Freudianism is dated, "Lizzie Borden" still packs a wallop as a work of music-drama. The recent Boston Lyric Opera production was a preview for a performance at Tanglewood this summer.
-
Four Saints in Three Acts Music
Intriguing Opera by Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thompson
By: - Nov 19th, 2013Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thomson collaborated on a one-of-a-kind opera that keeps on attracting audiences generation after generation. Conductor Gil Rose led a recent concert performance of the Boston Modern Orchestra Project at Jordan Hall, of the New England Conservatory. But, it’s an awful lot of whimsy. (And I hate whimsy.)
-
BU Fringe Festival: Nico Muhly's Dark Sisters Music
Mormon Polygamy as Subject
By: - Oct 13th, 2013Nico Muhly is the opera composer of the moment, getting a premiere at the Met later this month. Both his operas pick subjects "ripped from the headlines." His Dark Sisters was performed at the Boston University Fringe Festival
-
Boston Lyric Opera's New The Magic Flute Music
BLO Strips Work of Its Masonic Subtext
By: - Oct 07th, 2013Mozart's "The Magic Flute" has enchanting characters and intoxicating music. But it is often weighted down with its philosophical underpinnings. The BLO brings out its fairy tale elements to the delight of its audience.
-
The Merry Wives of Windsor at BU's Tsai Music
Nicolai's Rarely Done Opera Worth Waiting For
By: - Jul 29th, 2013The familiar story of the fat knight Falstaff's comeuppance by the two married women he attempts to seduce takes on a new complexion in Otto Nicolai's best known work. Boston Midsummer Opera’s production of “The Merry Wives of Windsor" was given three performances at Boston University's Tsai Performance Center.
-
"The Merry Wives of Windsor" Makes a Merry Evening at Boston Midsummer Opera Architecture
By: - Jul 29th, 2013anything over 255 chars will be deleted.
-
The Boston Early Music Festival Just Smashing Music
Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center June 21-23
By: - Jun 18th, 2013Handel wrote his first opera, "Almira," when he was only 19. Although it is no masterpiece, it shows at an early stage his gift for melody and his love of the high female voice. The renowned musical event comes to the Berkshires and Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center June 21-23.
-
John Harbison's Opera The Great Gatsby Music
July 11 at Tanglewood
By: - May 16th, 2013After its last outing at the Met a dozen years ago, Harbison's grand opera seemed to be forgotten. Now, a trimmer, more fleet version brings the works virtues to the fore. The opera will be performed at Tanglewood on July 11.
<< Previous Next >>