Parterre box

Parterre Box is an online magazine focused on opera, known for its playful, critical, and bold opinions, featuring a distinct gay perspective. It was established by James Jorden, a New Yorker and opera director, in 1993 while he was looking for work. Initially available in print, it has transitioned to a web-only format and is now recognized as a significant voice in the opera blogging community.

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Povera Butterfly - Parterre Box

1 week ago | parterre.com | Eli Jacobson

Small local opera companies are like delicate exotic flowers: They blossom for a short time under unstable conditions and wither away when the cold winter of economic insecurity and vagaries of artistic endeavor hit them. They come and they go, providing valuable experience for budding young talent and leaving broken dreams and some dreams that came true behind.
Never enough hours in the days of a queen

1 week ago | parterre.com | Christopher Corwin

Spring 2025 brings to New York two contrasting versions of Giulio Cesare, Handel’s most popular work: The English Concert brings it to Carnegie Hall (as well as several other venues) in concert, while R. B. Schlather stages it in his continuing Handel cycle at Hudson Hall. As a preview Chris’s Cache offers a rare pirate recording featuring Cecilia Bartoli, Andreas Scholl, and Les Arts Florissants. After Bartoli sang her first Cleopatras in Zurich in 2005, she waited a few years to try it out again.
New world coming

2 weeks ago | parterre.com | Christopher Corwin

For the conclusion of “Under-appreciated soprano” month, Chris’s Cache choses Johann Gottlieb Naumann’s Cora och Alonso, a little-known late German (really Swedish) baroque opera whose title lovers are sung by a pair probably too little heard in many households: soprano Inga Kalna and mezzo soprano Bernarda Fink. Born in Germany in 1741, Naumann became one of many itinerant opera composers active in the 18th century.
More people should listen to Ida Miccolis

2 weeks ago | parterre.com | Eli Jacobson

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T'amo ancora qual t'amava in basso stato

2 weeks ago | parterre.com | Christopher Corwin

Not only was Paul Plishka (who died on 3 February) a long-time Met stalwart, he also appeared often with Opera Orchestra of New York: twenty-two times in a astonishing variety of roles over more than a quarter-century. As this is “Donizetti Month” here on parterre box, Chris’s Cache offers Plishka and OONY with Carol Vaness in Anna Bolena and with Mariella Devia in the rarely heard Adelia. Plishka first appeared with OONY in the famous 1972 I Lombardi opposite Renata Scotto and José Carreras.
Violent delights

1 month ago | parterre.com | Chris Cohen

I don’t think I knew what opera even was, exactly, when my girlfriend bought us a subscription to the 2015 season in Santa Fe. We had moved there from New York more or less on impulse a few months ago, and we soon learned that there wasn’t much to do in town after dark. But, under the influence of youth and love, most anything was fun as long as we were doing it together, and, in that context, hiking up to the worst seats in the house on five consecutive Wednesdays sounded like a blast.
Think of the children

1 month ago | parterre.com | Christopher Corwin

Marking the composer’s 150th birthday which occurs on March 7th, Louis Langrée led with airy elegance the orchestra and singers from the Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts in an enchanting fairy-tale double bill of Ma Mère l’Oye and L’enfant et les sortilèges. The concert was held just up the block from Juilliard in Alice Tully Hall.
Plebe! Patrizia! Popolo!

1 month ago | parterre.com | Christopher Corwin

Ciofi performed infrequently in the US: as far as I know her appearances here included just Sophie in Der Rosenkavalier in San Diego; Violetta at Chicago Lyric and several roles in Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges with the New York Philharmonic. Throughout her career, Ciofi maintained a wide-ranging repertoire. The last time I saw her she was as a delicious Poppea opposite Anna Caterina Antonacci’s febrile Nerone in Paris in 2004. Their duets, conducted by René Jacobs, were spellbinding.
Bridges and tunnel

1 month ago | parterre.com | John Yohalem |James Jorden

Several years ago I sent a review to parterre that, in passing, mentioned a performance that had starred Kate Lindsay when actually it had been Kate Aldrich. The two mezzos have a similar vocal range, very different musical focus, and are both delightful to encounter in any cast. Luckily our intrepid La Cieca, James Jorden, caught me in the act and altered the copy.
Brutal Desire

1 month ago | parterre.com | David Fox |Cameron Kelsall

CAMERON KELSALL: Nearly 80 years after its debut, A Streetcar Named Desire remains an unimpeachable play. It withstands whatever directorial intervention or actor’s interpretative choice comes its way. And it certainly faces plenty in the production directed by Rebecca Frecknall, which originated at London’s Almeida Theatre and is now onstage at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.