Opera Canada

Opera Canada is a quarterly magazine focused on music, produced by Opera Canada Publications. It holds the distinction of being the longest-running arts magazine in Canada. This independent publication operates separately from the Canadian Opera Association. In the 1990s, alongside Opera and Opera News, it was recognized as one of the top three opera magazines in the English-speaking world.

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Manitoba Opera | La bohème | Opera Canada

2 weeks ago | operacanada.ca | Holly Harris

It may have taken 11 long years, but Manitoba Opera’s latest production of Puccini’s La bohème proved well worth the wait. Its tear-soaked tale of the ragtag bohemians living and dying in 1830s Paris is still able to pull hard at the heartstrings while packing an emotional punch.
Calgary Opera | Bluebeard's Castle and Gianni Schicchi | Opera Canada

2 weeks ago | operacanada.ca | Kenneth DeLong

Calgary Opera’s final offering of its 2024/25 season consisted of a double bill of two one-act operas, Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. While these two operas occupy different sound worlds, both received their first performances in the same year: 1918. Much care and effort went into the production of both operas, and with excellent results, most notably in the visual and dramatic side of things.
Glenn Gould School | Die Zauberflöte | Opera Canada

1 month ago | operacanada.ca | Michael Jones |Jennifer M. Tung

As their spring opera, the vocal department at the Glenn Gould School presented a fully-stage production of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte at Koerner Hall. Koerner Hall is an unusual venue for staged opera. It has no backstage area, no wings and no fly space (although they cleverly managed to fly in a noose for Papageno’s “suicide” aria in the second act). It has, however, an extraordinary acoustic, and even the least mature voices were well-balanced with the orchestra and well-heard in the hall.
Vancouver Opera | Flight | Opera Canada

2 months ago | operacanada.ca | Hadani Ditmars

My expectations for the Vancouver Opera production of Jonathan Dove’s Flight were high. Not only has Dove been dubbed “the Mozart of the 21st century,” but the 2020 Pacific Opera Victoria production by the legendary Canadian duo of set designer Ken MacDonald and director Morris Panych, which has been revived here with some revisions, was apparently Dove’s favourite.
Canadian Opera Company | La Reine-garçon | Opera Canada

2 months ago | operacanada.ca | Joseph So

Following the highly successful Puccini warhorse Madama Butterfly that opened the winter season at the Canadian Opera Company (COC) winter season, the company followed it with something entirely different, La Reine-garçon, a new opera and the first co-commission between Opéra de Montréal and the COC. It featured an excellent all-Canadian cast. Given the relatively conservative Canadian opera audience when it comes to new works, it was gratifying to witness the very enthusiastic ovation at the end.
Edmonton Opera | Bluebeard's Castle | Opera Canada

2 months ago | operacanada.ca | Bill Rankin

Edmonton Opera billed its second show of its 61st season as Bluebeard’s Castle, Béla Bartók and librettist Béla Balázs’s early 19th-century macabre tale of romantic doom, possibly even serial murder. And it was Bluebeard’s Castle, in a way. Although the ways in which it wasn’t were striking. Bartók’s score calls for nearly one hundred players. This adaptation by British composer/arranger Stephen Higgins featured seven players, one on a part, without any percussion, a significant absence.
Calgary Opera | Don Pasquale | Opera Canada

2 months ago | operacanada.ca | Kenneth DeLong

It has been over 20 years since Calgary Opera performed Donizetti’s fun-filled Don Pasquale. With a plot rooted in the Rossini-era comedy, the opera is often presented in an updated version, the previous Calgary 2002 outing a riff on the old West. This time the updating was to a blend of images drawn from Italy and America during the 1950s, the title character presented as an aging silent-era film star, with Dr. Maletesta a composer-director of film.
Canadian Opera Company | Madama Butterfly | Opera Canada

2 months ago | operacanada.ca | Joseph So

The Canadian Opera Company opened its winter season on January 24th with Madama Butterfly, one of Puccini’s most beloved operas. A quick bit of research shows that it was staged by the COC in its inaugural season of 1951, and it was subsequently revived a total of 15 seasons, the last in 2014. In fact, it was slated for its 16th production in 2022, but the COVID pandemic sadly reduced it into a single, online concert performance.Thankfully, we are once again able to experience its magic in person.
Metropolitan Opera | Tosca | Opera Canada

Nov 20, 2024 | operacanada.ca | Patrick Dillon

Editor’s Note: Although this production does not feature Canadian singers – it is conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin – this review is provided since the production will be available in cinemas across the country on November 23, 2024. Puccini’s Tosca was three weeks past its first birthday when it made its Metropolitan Opera (and American) debut on February 4, 1901.
Edmonton Opera | Die Fledermaus | Opera Canada

Nov 12, 2024 | operacanada.ca | Bill Rankin

Edmonton Opera opened its season on November 7th with a Die Fledermaus at the Jubilee Auditorium that people would recognize as Johann Strauss II’s 1874 operetta, because many of Strauss’s tunes were played and sung. Die Fledermaus has been adapted many times to film and has no doubt been bent into “updated” stage approaches. But Edmonton Opera’s artistic director Joel Ivany directed a reconstruction of the original effervescent light musical comedy with his own flair for disrupting expectations.