Thursday, April 1, 2010

Slatkin withdraws from Met's La Traviata - no April Fools joke

The Met just sent out this press release:

Casting Update

April 1, 2010

Conductor Leonard Slatkin has withdrawn from the remaining performances of La Traviata this season for personal reasons. Marco Armiliato will replace him at the April 3 evening performance, after conducting the matinee of Aida. Steven White, in his Met debut, will conduct the performance on April 10. Yves Abel will conduct on April 13, 17 matinee, 21, and 24. The April 7 performance is TBA.

La Traviata stars Angela Gheorghiu as Violetta, James Valenti as Alfredo, and Thomas Hampson as Giorgio Germont. The production is by Franco Zeffirelli. Hei-Kyung Hong sings the role of Violetta at the April 24 performance.

This season, Marco Armiliato conducts performances of the new production of Attila, as well as the revivals of Aida, La Fille du Régiment, and La Bohème. He also conducted the Metropolitan Opera National Council Grand Finals Concert last month.

Steven White has conducted a wide repertory of opera with companies around the United States and Canada, including New York City Opera, Vancouver Opera, L’Opéra de Montréal, Arizona Opera, Sarasota Opera, and Opera Roanoke, where he is artistic director.

Yves Abel made his Met debut in 1994 conducting Il Barbiere di Siviglia and also led Carmen here in the 1997-98 and 2002-03 seasons. He is scheduled to return to the Met for performances in the 2011-12 and 2012-13 seasons. The Canadian is principal guest conductor at Berlin’s Deutsche Oper, and regularly conducts at the Vienna State Opera. He has led performances at many of the world’s leading opera houses including La Scala, Paris Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and San Francisco Opera. He returns to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, later this season to conduct La Traviata with Angela Gheorghiu and James Valenti.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

James: Firstly, a rousing thank you for the thoughtful review and the Xennakis article, which arrived yesterday.
As to the timely withdrawal of slatkin, nice to not even have to read between the lines. There aren't too many conductors whose ineptitude would or should be tolerated. Even a fine musician like Placido Domingo (with far fewer directorial chops to his credit than Slatkin)provided "endless amusement" when embarking on La Boheme at The Big House. Will never forget it. But fortunately there are guys like Marco who were seemingly born to conduct opera (with no score, I assure you. He's not only amazing but the nicest guy in the world.