opera

Arts & Music

Jamie Allbritten to step down from the Piedmont Opera podium

4:59pm November 19, 2024

Singer, conductor and educator Jamie Allbritten will pass the baton to the next conductor of Piedmont Opera in March 2025. He says it's time for someone new to challenge the musicians in a different way.

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Polish countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński also breakdances, two skills showcased in Semele at Munich's Bavarian State Opera this year before it heads to New York's Metropolitan Opera next season.

From opera to breakdancing and back again: Jakub Józef Orliński fuses two worlds

12:56pm October 16, 2023

by Olivia Hampton

Polish countertenor and breakdancer Jakub Józef Orliński talks about his new album with Il Pomo d'Oro orchestra.

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Ryan McKinny and Joyce DiDonato star in the Metropolitan Opera's new production of Dead Man Walking, which opened Tuesday at the Met in New York.

North Carolina radio station plans to reject broadcasts of 'inappropriate' Met operas

3:29pm September 29, 2023

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

WCPE says that six contemporary operas being presented this season by the Metropolitan Opera — including ones dealing with violence, race and LGBTQ issues — are "unsuitable" for broadcast.

Baritone Samuel Schultz, who was sexually assaulted by famed countertenor David Daniels in 2010. Daniels pleaded guilty on Friday in a Houston courtroom.

After singer David Daniels' guilty plea, the victim speaks out

4:31pm August 07, 2023

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

The opera star who once sang on stages around the world suddenly pleaded guilty to sexual assault on Friday. The assaulted man, singer Samuel Schultz, reflects on the experiences he has endured.

David Daniels performs in the title role of Handel's Giulio Cesare at the Metropolitan Opera in 2007.

Opera singer David Daniels pleads guilty in sexual assault trial

8:38pm August 04, 2023

by Chloe Veltman

The world-renowned countertenor and his husband were accused of drugging and raping a young singer in 2010.

Arts

UNCSA announces new season with 21st century conservatory in mind

4:05pm August 25, 2022

by David Ford

The University of North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem has just announced its upcoming perfor

Karim Sulayman, Raha Mirzadegan, Coral Dolphin and John Taylor Ward perform in Unholy Wars in Charleston, S.C., in May.

An Arab American singer reframes music about the Crusades

2:36pm June 20, 2022

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

A new project conceived by Lebanese American tenor Karim Sulayman recasts baroque music that by turns demonizes and exoticizes Arabs and Muslims.

Tenor Jamez McCorkle, who debuted the title role in the opera Omar, by Rhiannon Giddens and Michael Abels, which received its world premiere on May 27 in Charleston, S.C., at Spoleto Festival USA.

The debut of 'Omar,' a thoroughly American opera

12:20pm June 07, 2022

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

Composers Rhiannon Giddens and Michael Abels have brought a true story to the opera stage: the life of Omar Ibn Said, a Senegalese Muslim scholar who was enslaved and brought to the Carolinas.

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American composer Carlisle Floyd, photographed at his first home, in which he composed his best known opera, Susannah, in Tallahassee, Fla. in 2009.

Music & Culture

Carlisle Floyd, a founding father of American opera, has died at age 95

4:12pm September 30, 2021

by Tom Huizenga

Known primarily for his southern-flavored operas, Floyd helped create an American opera vernacular. His 1955 hit Susannah won the New York Music Critics Circle Award and helped launch his career.

Composer and pianist Anthony Davis, winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Music.

Anthony Davis Wins Pulitzer Prize For His Opera 'The Central Park Five'

6:47pm May 04, 2020

by Anastasia Tsioulcas

The Central Park Five is an operatic narrative retelling the true story about the five African-American and Latino teenagers wrongly convicted of raping and assaulting a white woman in 1989.