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Joyce El-Khoury
Joyce El-Khoury is a Lebanese-Canadian opera singer performing with leading opera companies and symphony orchestras around the world. She is a soprano praised for her bel canto singing. Early life and education El-Khoury was born in Beirut, Lebanon, to Jean and Alex El-Khoury. She has two sisters, Cynthia El-Khoury Najm and Krista Jane El-Khoury – the latter also a singer. She came to Ottawa, Ontario, with her family at the age of six, and began taking private voice lessons at the age of 15 with Karen Spicer. With support from her teacher and parents, she pursued voice at the University of Ottawa under the tutelage of Ingemar Korjus. After graduating her Bachelor of Music (Performance) at the University of Ottawa, she pursued her studies at the Academy of Vocal Arts (AVA) in Philadelphia while studying with Bill Schuman. El-Khoury was then invited to study at the Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program while continuing her studies with Schuman. Her m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beirut
Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coast. Beirut has been inhabited for more than 5,000 years, and was one of Phoenicia's most prominent city states, making it one of the oldest cities in the world (see Berytus). The first historical mention of Beirut is found in the Amarna letters from the New Kingdom of Egypt, which date to the 14th century BC. Beirut is Lebanon's seat of government and plays a central role in the Lebanese economy, with many banks and corporations based in the city. Beirut is an important seaport for the country and region, and rated a Beta + World City by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. Beirut was severely damaged by the Lebanese Civil War, the 2006 Lebanon War, and the 2020 massive explosion in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Otello
''Otello'' () is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeare's play ''Othello''. It was Verdi's penultimate opera, first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on 5 February 1887. The composer was reluctant to write anything new after the success of ''Aida'' in 1871, and he retreated into retirement. It took his Milan publisher Giulio Ricordi the next ten years, first to encourage the revision of Verdi's 1857 ''Simon Boccanegra'' by introducing Boito as librettist and then to begin the arduous process of persuading and cajoling Verdi to see Boito's completed libretto for ''Otello'' in July/August 1881. However, the process of writing the first drafts of the libretto and the years of their revision, with Verdi all along not promising anything, dragged on. It wasn't until 1884, five years after the first drafts of the libretto, that composition began, with most of the work finishing in late 1885. When it finally premiere ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Belisario
''Belisario'' (''Belisarius'') is a ''tragedia lirica'' (tragic opera) in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian libretto after Luigi Marchionni's adaptation of play, ''Belisarius'', first staged in Munich in 1820 and then (in Italian) in Naples in 1826. The plot is loosely based on the life of the famous general Belisarius of the 6th century Byzantine Empire. It premiered to critical and popular success on 4 February 1836 at the Teatro La Fenice, Venice, and was given many additional performances that season,Osborne 1994, pp. 245-248 although Donizetti scholar William Ashbrook notes that there would have been more had the opera not been presented so late in the season. However, in spite of its initial short-term success and critical reaction, as represented by a review in ''La Gazzetta privilegiata'' which stated that "A new masterwork has been added to Italian music.....''Belisario'' not only pleased and delighted, but also conquered, enflamed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opera Lyra Ottawa
Opera Lyra Ottawa (OLO) was a non-profit professional opera company based in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1984 by Canadian soprano Diana Gilchrist after the demise of the National Arts Centre's annual summer opera productions. The company performed fully staged and concert version operas in their original language with French and English surtitles at the National Arts Centre as well as running outreach and young artist programs. As of 14 October 2015, Opera Lyra has ceased operations. A new company, New Opera Lyra, had its inaugural first season on October 28-29th History The company was founded in 1984 in response to the National Arts Center's decision to end further opera productions due to budget constraints. Opera Lyra's founder and first Artistic Director was Diana Gilchrist, a young Canadian soprano at the very start of her career. Initially the company performed operas in chamber versions with piano accompaniment in the tiny York Street Theatre in Ottawa. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Des Moines Metro Opera
Des Moines Metro Opera is an opera company in Indianola, Iowa, a town of approximately 14,000 inhabitants which lies some south of Des Moines, Iowa. It was founded by Robert L. Larsen and Douglas Duncan in 1973. The director is Michael Egel. During its annual summer opera festival, the company performs three mainstage operas in rolling repertory during June and July. Programming Most of the company's opera productions are performed at the Blank Center for the Performing Arts on the campus of Simpson College. In 1986 the company presented a new opera based on Shakespeare's ''The Tempest'', with music by Lee Hoiby and a libretto by Mark Shulgasser. The company's first performance of an opera in a language other than English was ''Tosca'' in 1998, at the Civic Center in Des Moines. Singers Singers who had their start with the company include Kimm Julian Kimm is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bruce Kimm (born 1951), American baseball player, manager and c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Rondine
''La rondine'' (''The Swallow'') is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Giuseppe Adami, based on a libretto by Alfred Maria Willner and . It was first performed at the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo (or the Théâtre du Casino) in Monte Carlo on 27 March 1917. Composition history In autumn 1913, the directors of Vienna's Carltheater commissioned Puccini to compose a Viennese operetta. After confirming that it could take the form of a comic opera with no spoken dialogue in the style of ''Der Rosenkavalier'', "only more entertaining and more organic,"Gavin Plumly, "Puccini's Bittersweet Operetta", San Francisco Opera program, Nov/Dec 2007, pp. 30/31 he agreed. The work proceeded for two years, sometimes intensely, sometimes with great difficulty, and in spring 1916 the opera was finished. The originally intended Viennese première was impeded by the outbreak of World War I and the entrance of Italy in the Alliance against Austria-Hungary, hence the Opà ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Welsh National Opera
Welsh National Opera (WNO) ( cy, Opera Cenedlaethol Cymru) is an opera company based in Cardiff, Wales; it gave its first performances in 1946. It began as a mainly amateur body and transformed into an all-professional ensemble by 1973. In its early days the company gave a single week's annual season in Cardiff, gradually extending its schedule to become an all-year-round operation, with its own salaried chorus and orchestra. It has been described by ''The New York Times'' as "one of the finest operatic ensembles in Europe". For most of its existence the company lacked a permanent base in Cardiff, but in 2004 it moved into the new Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff Bay. The company tours nationally and internationally, giving more than 120 performances annually, with a repertoire of eight operas each year, to a combined audience of more than 150,000 people. Its most frequent venues other than Cardiff are Llandudno in Wales and Bristol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Milton Keynes, Oxfo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Traviata
''La traviata'' (; ''The Fallen Woman'') is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on ''La Dame aux camélias'' (1852), a play by Alexandre Dumas ''fils'' adapted from his own 1848 novel. The opera was originally titled ''Violetta'', after the main character. It was first performed on 6 March 1853 at La Fenice opera house in Venice. Piave and Verdi wanted to follow Dumas in giving the opera a contemporary setting, but the authorities at La Fenice insisted that it be set in the past, "c. 1700". It was not until the 1880s that the composer's and librettist's original wishes were carried out and " realistic" productions were staged. ''La traviata'' has become immensely popular and is among the most frequently performed of all operas. Composition history For Verdi, the years 1851 to 1853 were filled with operatic activity. First, he had agreed with the librettist Salvadore Cammarano on a subject for what would ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carmen
''Carmen'' () is an opera in four acts by the French composer Georges Bizet. The libretto was written by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the Carmen (novella), novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée. The opera was first performed by the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875, where its breaking of conventions shocked and scandalised its first audiences. Bizet died suddenly after the 33rd performance, unaware that the work would achieve international acclaim within the following ten years. ''Carmen'' has since become one of the most popular and frequently performed operas in the classical Western canon, canon; the "Habanera (aria), Habanera" from act 1 and the "Toreador Song" from act 2 are among the best known of all operatic arias. The opera is written in the genre of ''opéra comique'' with musical numbers separated by dialogue. It is set in southern Spain and tells the story of the downfall of Don José, a naïve soldier who is seduced by the wiles of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Operabase
Operabase is an online database of opera performances, opera houses and companies, and performers themselves as well as their agents. Found at operabase.com, it was created in 1996 by English software engineer and opera lover Mike Gibb.Edward Schneider (29 July 2001),"Singing and Their Suppers" ''The New York Times''. Retrieved 13 May 2011. Initially a hobby site, it became his full-time occupation after three years. ''Opera'' magazine describes the Operabase website as "the most comprehensive source of data on operatic activity". Public website By its tenth anniversary, in 2006, the site received "about 10,000 visitors a day to the public site, who look at over four million pages a month between them. Of these, fewer than half use English, 17% use German, 12% Italian, 10% French, 9% Spanish." In autumn of that year the British magazine ''Opera Now'' reported that "Operabase has taken on the Herculean task of making he siteavailable to every European Union citizen in their own la ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Knoxville Opera
The Knoxville Opera is an American opera company based in Knoxville, Tennessee. It was founded in 1978 as the Knoxville Civic Opera by Edward Zambara, who served as Artistic Director until 1981. The company changed its name and became an entirely professional opera company in 1983. Since 1981 the company has had three General Directors who also served as the Principal Conductor; Robert Lyall who served from 1982-1999, Francis Graffeo from 2000-2005, and Brian Salesky who has served in the position since 2005. The 1978 inaugural performance of ''La Traviata'' included opera stars Delores Ziegler and Knoxville native Mary Costa, who garnered fame for creating the voice of Princess Aurora in the 1959 Disney film '' Sleeping Beauty''. Notable appearances with the company include gala performances by Luciano Pavarotti, Marilyn Horne, Cheryl Studer and Catherine Malfitano, in addition to leading roles performed by Rosalind Elias, Mary Dunleavy, Enrico Di Giuseppe, and Faith Esh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pagliacci
''Pagliacci'' (; literal translation, "Clowns") is an Italian opera in a prologue and two acts, with music and libretto by Ruggero Leoncavallo. The opera tells the tale of Canio, actor and leader of a commedia dell'arte theatrical company, who murders his wife Nedda and her lover Silvio on stage during a performance. ''Pagliacci'' premiered at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan on 21 May 1892, conducted by Arturo Toscanini, with Adelina Stehle as Nedda, Fiorello Giraud as Canio, Victor Maurel as Tonio, and Mario Ancona as Silvio. Soon after its Italian premiere, the opera played in London (with Nellie Melba as Nedda) and in New York (on 15 June 1893, with Agostino Montegriffo as Canio). ''Pagliacci'' is the composer's only opera that is still widely performed. ''Pagliacci'' is often staged with ''Cavalleria rusticana'' by Pietro Mascagni, a double bill known colloquially as "Cav and Pag". Origin and disputes Leoncavallo was a little-known composer when Pietro Mascagni's ''Cavalleria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
