| Broadway | Opera | Home |
Updates
02/13/04
Prepare for a few revisions, now and in the future. There are a couple of reviews that, when I read them over, seem kind of rushed; I gushed about the things I liked but didn't really give an objective critical view of the CD or video. Not only am I going to be careful about future reviews, I'm going to expand and qualify a lot of the old reviews. Plus, as happens with anything, the initial delight has worn off of some recordings so that while I still love them I can also appreciate their faults.
Revised Review: Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Marriner)
New Review: No Tenors Allowed: Famous Italian Duets for Baritone & Bass (Hampson & Ramey, performers)
New Review: Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Solti)
New Review: Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Böhm) (VIDEO)
11/01/03
Lots happening since I updated last. I saw my first live opera! (Don Giovanni) If the Teatro Lirico d'Europa (something like that) tour comes near you, go see it, it is wonderful.
Two books you might like: I picked up a copy of The Penguin Guide to Opera on Compact Disc. What a cool book! I don't agree with everything they say but in general they sound like they know what they are talking about. I will probably be consulting it to find further recordings to review. And all opera fans should check out A Night at the Opera by Sir Denis Forman. It is really funny but informative too, with tongue-in-cheek plot synopses, glossaries, etc.
I made a slight change to the format. Now the date the review was written appears after the text of the review, on the lower right, along with the dates of any major revisions. So far I only put this in for the Opera part of the site, but I'll do the Broadway part as soon as I have a chance.
OK, now the updates to the site:
Somehow I had forgotten to put Le Nozze di Figaro (Gardiner) (VIDEO) on the Title page, although I'd added it to the Artists, Composers, and Conductors lists. It's fixed now.
New Review: Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Ferro) (VIDEO)
New Review: Così fan tutte (Böhm)
New Review: Don Giovanni (Furtwängler) (VIDEO)
New Review: Don Giovanni (von Karajan) (VIDEO)
New Review: Idomeneo, re di Creta (Levine) (VIDEO)
New Review: Le Nozze di Figaro (Olmi) (VIDEO)
New Review: Die Zauberflöte (Sawallisch) (VIDEO)
A new addition to the site! I'm now going to occasionally put up individual pages for artists I particularly like. I may make it a site section when there are a few more of them, but right now there are only two: Francisco Araiza and Anton Dermota. These pages are also accessible from a link next to their names in the Artist listing.
08/16/03
Look, I'm Dmitri Shostakovich! Scroll down to the bottom of the Home page for the link to the Dead Russian Composers personality test. It's fun!
I've been having my own person film fest! Take a look:
New Review: Il Barbiere di Siviglia (VIDEO)
New Review: La Cenerentola (Abbado) (VIDEO)
New Review: La Cenerentola (Chailly) (VIDEO)
New Review: Les Contes d'Hoffman (VIDEO)
New Review: Così fan tutte (VIDEO)
New Review: Le Nozze di Figaro (VIDEO)
But I haven't abandoned CDs:
New Review: Così fan tutte
New Review: Il Barbiere di Siviglia
07/14/03
Sorry for the insanely long time between updates, but you can see I haven't been twiddling my thumbs. The site has a new look, a new name, and a new section - Opera reviews. Please take a look and let me know what you think!
New Review: A Little Night Music OBC
11/13/02
Been AGES since I updated, hasn't it? I'm sorry - I'll try to be better about it in the future. It's hard to find the time to write reviews though when you're juggling school, homework, cross-country practice, and a job. Cross-country's over now though so I'm hoping I will have some more free time. (Fingers crossed!)
I've decided to attack the synopsis idea from a new angle - it's hard enough to find time to write reviews, and writing the synopses would just be too much work entirely. Instead, I've linked the page for each CD to a synospis on another site. Many are from Musicals.Net or TheatreHistory.com, while others are from show-specific sites. Hopefully I haven't offended anyone by linking directly to their synopsis & not to their front page, but if I have, please just let me know and we'll work it out. I'm not trying to step on anyone's toes!
To celebrate Halloween, I revised the Sweeney Todd: Live In Concert review. It's more of a review and less of a rant now.
New Review: The Fix Original London Cast
New Review: Anne of Green Gables Charlottetown Festival Cast
06/28/02
This month was the six month anniversary to my page! And I have discovered I have at least one reader! :) (You know who you are!)
To celebrate I have begun adding a synopsis of each show; that way I avoid bogging myself down within the reviews. So far I have written synopses for Elisabeth and The Scarlet Pimpernel. WARNING: All the synopses contain major plot spoilers!
Since I now have the synopsis, the review for the Elisabeth Essen Cast has been completely revised.
For your convenience, the reviews are now also sorted by Composer!
New Review Added: Elisabeth Original Vienna Cast.
New Review Added: South Pacific 2002 RNT London Cast.
Noticed that my review for the Jane Eyre OBC was more of a rant about the Tony Awards. Completely rewrote the review so it was actually about the CD this time. (Such a great CD deserves to be properly reviewed!)
Discovered that I had entirely failed to credit Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler as the composer and bookwriter on the Sweeney Todd OBC page. That's fixed now.
04/15/02
Been quiet for a while, haven't I? Hopefull it's not a state of affairs that will continue. ;)
We've hit the 30-review mark! I added a review of the Pride and Prejudice: Concept Cast.
Randomly noticed that Gay Soper and Barry James somehow got left off the artist list. I think M. & Mme Thenardier are main characters, don't you? :) At least on the CSR they are. So I fixed that.
02/10/02
Added a review of Elisabeth: Essen Cast.
Compressed the page intro into only what I really needed to say. Repeat visitors will note that the front page looks much less like a book now! ;-)
Found out that the Reviews By Artist page looked really crappy in Netscape, so I completely recoded it using a table. If you use Internet Explorer, it shouldn't look too much different. If you use Netscape, it should look way different - and much better.
Fixed some typos and page appearance errors in the old reviews.
01/19/02
Added a review of The Secret Garden OBC.
01/13/02
Happy New Year!
Added reviews of City of Angels OBC and The Secret Garden London Cast.
12/29/01
Added a review of Ron Bohmer's solo CD Everyman.
12/16/01
The Musical Theater CD Website is officially launched! So obviously, everything is new. :-) We currently have 24 reviews: 21 CDs and 3 videos!
