SF Opera's 2006-2007 Season
February 02, 2006
Looking at the upcoming season for 2006-2007 for San Francisco Opera, I felt a bit boggled. Even the new site design was somewhat alarming, simply because the aesthetic is about a 180 degree turn, from pop to traditional. Then I remembered that Pamela Rosenberg has left for the Berlin Philharmonic and David Gockley, most recently of the Houston Grand Opera, is the new general director.
The season is as follows:
Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera
J. Strauss, Jr.'s Die Fledermaus
Verdi's Rigeletto
Wagner's Tristan und Isolde
Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia
Puccini's Manon Lescaut
Bizet's Carmen
Mozart's Don Giovanni
R. Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier
Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride
First of all, there are ten operas, more than we've had in recent memory. Second, there are no contemporary operas included. How strange, indeed. At least the productions of Tristan und Isolde and Don Giovanni look particularly unpromising, the former is directed by Herbert Kellner, who used Noh puppeteers in the Chicago Lyric Ring, and the latter apparently has an oversized skeleton in the last scene.
As for interesting singers, Deborah Voigt is singing Amelia in Un Ballo, Karita Mattila is Manon Lescaut, and Bo Skovhus is Oreste in Iphigénie.