Opera For Everyone

Ep. 145 Parsifal by Wagner

Richard Wagner refused to call Parsifal an opera, but instead considered it a rite of “consecration.” For many years, its performance was restricted to the small German t

Ep. 144 Wagner's Lohengrin

Lohengrin is THE quintessential “knight in shining armor” coming to the rescue of a damsel in distress.  Swanning in on his mysterious boat, he is a literal answer to her

Ep, 143 The Wreckers by Ethel Smyth

Cornwall in the mid-eighteenth century was a remote and isolated region along the southwest coast of Britain, one where a ship and its crew might easily be dashed on the

Ep. 142 Alcina by Handel

A seemingly all-powerful sorceress rules over her own island domain.  She enchants not only nature, but also men, who are helpless to resist her charms.  And when she doe

Ep. 141 Attila by Verdi

Known to history as “The Scourge of God,” Attila was a rampaging conqueror who famously turned aside from the city of Rome after a meeting with the Pope.  In this version

Ep. 140 Moby Dick by Jake Heggie

All hands on deck! This episode of Opera for Everyone dives headlong into a leviathan of 21st-century opera: Jake Heggie’s Moby-Dick (2010). Adapted from Melville’s class

Ep. 139 Le Prophète by Meyerbeer

When an entrenched oligarchy and a cynical revolution go to war with one another, what happens to all the people in the middle?  Some may be victimized, others silenced,

Ep. 138 Rienzi, The Last of the Tribunes, by Wagner

Richard Wagner’s first truly successful opera, set in medieval Rome, sees a young nobleman in love with a young plebeian woman.  While this might sound like it’s going to

Ep. 137 The Threepenny Opera by Weill and Brecht

Mac the Knife, terror of the London criminal underworld, is a character paradoxically best known to many as the subject of the upbeat, bubbly eponymous 1955, 1959, and 19

Ep. 136 Ravel's L'Enfant et les sortilèges

Can an opera, that most complex of art forms, take you back to childhood?  Unlikely though it might seem, L’Enfant et les Sortilèges (“The Child and the Enchantments”) do

Ep. 135 The Rake's Progress

Which is stronger: the temptations of a shadowy wish-granter, or the love of a virtuous woman?  In The Rake’s Progress, Tom’s true love Anne seeks to save him from himsel

Ep. 134 King Arthur by Henry Purcell

King Arthur stands astride the intersection of history, myth, legend, and politics.  In every age of the history of Britain, he is reinterpreted for new audiences and new

Ep. 133 Semele by Handel

It might at first sound like it would be nice to be the lover of the king of the Olympian gods, attended by divine spirits, and living in a luxurious palace among the clo

Ep. 132 Verdi's Aida

The young Aida loves the dashing military commander Radamès, and he adores her with a burning passion.Their mutual love is, however, somewhat complicated by the fact that

Ep. 131 Wagner's Tannhäuser

If you’re going to have a love triangle, why not have a singing knight, a literal saint, and the Goddess of Love herself?  Come and enjoy the kind of sweeping, romantic,

Ep. 130 Orlando Furioso by Vivaldi

Once upon a time, there was a heroic knight, the greatest of Charlamagne’s famed paladins, and his name was Orlando (or Roland, depending on whom you ask.)  Among his man

Ep. 129 Roméo et Juliette by Berlioz

You’ve never heard the story of Romeo and Juliet told like this! Not even if you have listened to the three previous episodes in which Pat and Kathleen discuss three oper

Ep. 128 Médée (Medea) by Charpentier

What can one woman do, when set against the entire world? Quite a lot, if she happens to be the sorceress Medea.  This French Baroque opera written by Marc Antoine Charpe

Ep. 127 Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg

Can a young man win a wife through a singing competition?  He just might, if he’s in Richard Wagner’s romantic comedy (yes, you read that right, “Richard Wagner’s romanti

Ep. 126 Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi

Ill-fated lovers caught up in a world incapable of supporting love not sanctioned by officialdom… it’s a story for the ages.  Join Pat and Kathleen for their third look a