Hello Gentlemen,
It's Asian Nicole. "The Marriage of Figaro" - one of the most greatest operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart runs through from January 27 to February 18, 2023 at the Four Seasons Centre, Downtown, Toronto. My darling Opera Professor and I went to see this famous opera on Thursday night, February 2nd. The performance time is three hours and 30 minutes.
Mozart serves up the most luminous and profound music for this subversive story of servants who topple their masters and women who prove wiser than the men around them. Claus Guth’s acclaimed production features the return of Canadian bass-baritone Gordon Bintner, a graduate of the COC’s Ensemble Studio training program, as the Count.
The Marriage of Figaro is a commedia per musica in four acts composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an Italian libretto written by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 1 May 1786. The story is about how the servants Figaro and Susanna succeed in getting married, foiling the efforts of their philandering employer Count Almaviva to seduce Susanna and teaching him a lesson in fidelity.
Mozart created a world theatre of human passions that testifies to the elemental force of eroticism. All forms of love and desire are found in this opera, and the four generations of characters presented in exemplary fashion are completely torn between morality, desire and impulse. In Figaro, Mozart not only allows all kinds of intense human passions but also portrays how they can get out of control and escalate to extremes, thus setting his opera far apart from the comedy by Beaumarchais.
Originally created by Claus Guth for the 2006 Salzburg Festival to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birthday, this production was last performed by the COC in 2016, featuring the same sets and costumes.
" I wanted to follow the characters into their darkest psychological depths, but at the same time leave space for exploring the utopian moments in Mozart's music, which for me are so special in the score of Figaro. An invented character, a kind of Eros angel, indicates this confusing other dimension that pervades the opera." - by Claus Guth, Salzburg, 2011
Claus Guth (born 1964) is a German theatre director, focused on opera. He has directed operas at major houses and festivals, including world premieres such as works of the Munich Biennale, and Berio's Cronaca del luogo at the Salzburg Festival in 1999. Guth is particularly known for his opera productions of the works of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. He has received two Faust awards, for Daphne by Richard Strauss in 2010, and for Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande, both at the Oper Frankfurt.
The two bass-baritone leads are both masters of their characters. Italian Luca Pisaroni is a borderline nerdy, but charming Figaro with a magnetic voice. Canadian Gordon Bintner is every bit the haughty and dangerous Count, with a charismatic stage presence. They are perfectly paired with two sopranos of equal vocal and acting prowess. American Andrea Carroll is a mellower-voiced Susanna with clear phrasing, but it is her vibrant portrayal of mischief and mockery of her upper class superiors that steal the show. The Countess’ two arias, “Dove sono” and “Porgi amor”, are beautifully sung by Australian Lauren Fagan. This is her COC debut, and leaves us hoping she will be back soon.
In 2017, BBC News Magazine asked 172 opera singers to vote for the best operas ever written. The Marriage of Figaro came in first out of the 20 operas featured, with the magazine describing the work as being "one of the supreme masterpieces of operatic comedy, whose rich sense of humanity shines out of Mozart’s miraculous score".
BRAVO!!! What a phenomenal opera! Thanks so much for taking me to see it, my darling opera professor! I really enjoyed it!
It's Asian Nicole. "The Marriage of Figaro" - one of the most greatest operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart runs through from January 27 to February 18, 2023 at the Four Seasons Centre, Downtown, Toronto. My darling Opera Professor and I went to see this famous opera on Thursday night, February 2nd. The performance time is three hours and 30 minutes.
Mozart serves up the most luminous and profound music for this subversive story of servants who topple their masters and women who prove wiser than the men around them. Claus Guth’s acclaimed production features the return of Canadian bass-baritone Gordon Bintner, a graduate of the COC’s Ensemble Studio training program, as the Count.
The Marriage of Figaro is a commedia per musica in four acts composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an Italian libretto written by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 1 May 1786. The story is about how the servants Figaro and Susanna succeed in getting married, foiling the efforts of their philandering employer Count Almaviva to seduce Susanna and teaching him a lesson in fidelity.
Mozart created a world theatre of human passions that testifies to the elemental force of eroticism. All forms of love and desire are found in this opera, and the four generations of characters presented in exemplary fashion are completely torn between morality, desire and impulse. In Figaro, Mozart not only allows all kinds of intense human passions but also portrays how they can get out of control and escalate to extremes, thus setting his opera far apart from the comedy by Beaumarchais.
Originally created by Claus Guth for the 2006 Salzburg Festival to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birthday, this production was last performed by the COC in 2016, featuring the same sets and costumes.
" I wanted to follow the characters into their darkest psychological depths, but at the same time leave space for exploring the utopian moments in Mozart's music, which for me are so special in the score of Figaro. An invented character, a kind of Eros angel, indicates this confusing other dimension that pervades the opera." - by Claus Guth, Salzburg, 2011
Claus Guth (born 1964) is a German theatre director, focused on opera. He has directed operas at major houses and festivals, including world premieres such as works of the Munich Biennale, and Berio's Cronaca del luogo at the Salzburg Festival in 1999. Guth is particularly known for his opera productions of the works of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. He has received two Faust awards, for Daphne by Richard Strauss in 2010, and for Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande, both at the Oper Frankfurt.
The two bass-baritone leads are both masters of their characters. Italian Luca Pisaroni is a borderline nerdy, but charming Figaro with a magnetic voice. Canadian Gordon Bintner is every bit the haughty and dangerous Count, with a charismatic stage presence. They are perfectly paired with two sopranos of equal vocal and acting prowess. American Andrea Carroll is a mellower-voiced Susanna with clear phrasing, but it is her vibrant portrayal of mischief and mockery of her upper class superiors that steal the show. The Countess’ two arias, “Dove sono” and “Porgi amor”, are beautifully sung by Australian Lauren Fagan. This is her COC debut, and leaves us hoping she will be back soon.
In 2017, BBC News Magazine asked 172 opera singers to vote for the best operas ever written. The Marriage of Figaro came in first out of the 20 operas featured, with the magazine describing the work as being "one of the supreme masterpieces of operatic comedy, whose rich sense of humanity shines out of Mozart’s miraculous score".
BRAVO!!! What a phenomenal opera! Thanks so much for taking me to see it, my darling opera professor! I really enjoyed it!
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