Ted Huffman is one of the most successful American opera directors at work in Europe. His vivid stagings of classic and contemporary works are characterized by a sensitive engagement with music and text, as well as precise and detailed work with his singers. Perhaps surprisingly for a young and in-demand director, he does not have […]
Author Archives: A.J. Goldmann
… is a journalist and critic based in Munich. He has written about music and theater for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Gramophone and The Spectator. Until it folded in 2023, he was the Berlin, Vienna and Salzburg correspondent for Opera News Magazine.
Posted inReview
Rings Under the Eyes
My year of chasing new Ring cycles across Europe ended, appropriately enough, in flames. On May 4, at London’s Royal Opera House, the second performance of Barrie Kosky’s “Die Walküre” provided a shattering conclusion to a busy, bruising season that has seen a staggering number of new productions of Wagner’s tetralogy undertaken by Europe’s major […]
Posted inReview
More Than Caviar and Nostalgia
Earlier this month, audiences at Osterfestspiele Salzburg (Salzburg Easter Festival) stepped into a world of shadows and smoke. Simon McBurney’s stark new production of Mussorgsky’s “Khovanshchina”—co-produced with the Metropolitan Opera and conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen—anchored the final installment of the festival’s three-year experiment without a resident orchestra. Onstage, religious and political factions battled for Russia’s […]
Posted inInterview
Human Tension
Peter Sellars is one of today’s most innovative theater and opera directors. From his daring early work, including a famous / infamous Mozart-Da Ponte trilogy, which included a “Don Giovanni” set in East Harlem and a “Nozze di Figaro” in Trump Tower, to his groundbreaking Salzburg production of Messiaen’s “Saint François d’Assise” and through to […]