Some obscure early operas being dug up these days deserve to remain obscure. Not so Christoph Willibald Gluck’s “Paride ed Elena.” Premiered in Vienna in 1770, this five-act “drama per musica” is ...
In the mid-1700s, Christoph Willibald Gluck overthrew the musical excesses around him. A marathon double bill in France shows the vibrancy of his vision. By Zachary Woolfe Reporting from ...
In May of 1774, 15 years before the French Revolution, the 18-year-old Marie Antoinette ascended the throne as queen of France. Less than a month before that, German composer Christoph Willibald Gluck ...
Christoph Willibald (Ritter von) Gluck (2 July 1714 – 15 November 1787) was a German composer of Italian and French opera in the early classical period. Born in the Upper Palatinate and raised in ...
It’s one of the most oft retold stories of Greek mythology. The beautiful Eurydice, beloved of the musician Orpheus, dies and is confined to Hades. Orpheus uses his musical magic to secure her release ...
It’s a tale familiar from Virgil and Ovid. The beautiful Eurydice, newly married to the musician Orpheus, is killed by a snakebite. Overcome with grief, Orpheus descends to Hades to bring her back to ...
The 2007 production, sung in the original French, has returned this month with the same starry cast of singers in principal roles -- mezzo-soprano Susan Graham (Iphig nie), tenor Placido Domingo ...
Love lost, regained, lost again ...? Is there a sadder tale to tell than that mythic one of Orpheus and Eurydice? He braves the dangers of hell to bring his beloved back from the dead but blows it ...
We're in concert with an orchestra called Europa Galante, and music by Boccherini and Gluck. It's a pair of encores from a concert in Germany. First, Fabio Biondi leads Europa Galante in a movement ...
Donald Macleod explores the life and work of one of his operatic favourites, Christoph Willibald Gluck. Macleod describes himself as "a huge fan" of the music of this week's Composer Of The Week, ...