Skip to main content

Fred Cohn

is a frequent contributor to OPERA NEWS and the magazine's research associate.

Articles

  • Inner Life
    Mathieu Amalric and Anne Consigny in Julian Schnabel’s 2007 film of Bauby’s memoir
    Spotlight October 2023

    Inner Life

    Dallas Opera presents a Joby Talbot world premiere.

  • Alcina at Caramoor
    Concerts & Recitals, Online Exclusive September 2023

    Alcina at Caramoor

    "This Alcina is not a profound work: it has none of the dramatic complexity of Monteverdi’s contemporaneous operas. But the music is extremely diverting. Caccini’s score works its own kind of sorcery, in lilting dance movements and eloquent recitatives. The composer’s setting of text is especially compelling: the vocal lines are characterful and expressive, and governed by the cadences of human speech."

  • Rachel Willis-Sørensen: Four Last Songs

    Rachel Willis-Sørensen: Four Last Songs

    “Willis-Sørensen’s voice responds keenly to Strauss’s vocal writing. The top is its glory.”

  • Così Fan Tutte at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis
    North America September 2023

    Così Fan Tutte at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis

    "Director Tara Branham took a wildly intrusive approach to Così Fan Tutte, placing the work not in eighteenth-century Naples but in World War II-era England. It would be nice to report that this Così’s musical presentation helped redeem the dreadful production, but this was not the case. Conductor Jeri Lynne Johnson maintained tight coordination between stage and pit but offered her cast little opportunity for nuance: the music marched forward in fixed formation. Most of the singing was too loud, with the performers rarely aiming for dynamic levels below mezzo-forte."

  • Tosca at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis
    North America September 2023

    Tosca at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis

    "This intelligent production did not mine Tosca’s full theatrical value, largely because it was hard to believe in the passionate connection between Katie Van Kooten’s Tosca and Robert Stahley’s Cavaradossi."

  • Susannah at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis
    North America September 2023

    Susannah at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis

    "Given OTSL’s longstanding commitment to American opera, it is remarkable that it had never offered Susannah until this season. Patricia Racette’s production filled the lacuna, telling the sad, simple story plainly and effectively and making a thoroughly convincing argument for the dramatic validity of Carlisle Floyd’s 1955 opera."

  • Treemonisha at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis
    North America September 2023

    Treemonisha at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis

    Opera Theatre of Saint Louis’s forty-eighth festival season included works by Joplin, Floyd, Puccini and Mozart.

  • Books: The Wanderer

    Books: The Wanderer

  • Earned Moment
    Cover Story September 2023

    Earned Moment

    Joyce DiDonato & Jake Heggie join forces for the Met premiere of Dead Man Walking.