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By Ben Mattison
24 Sep 2005
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| Denyce Graves as Carmen in Madrid |
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| photo by Javier del Real |
The Lyric Opera of Chicago opens its 2005-06 season tonight with a gala performance of Bizet's Carmen, with Denyce Graves in the title role.
The cast also include Mark Thomsen, filling in for the ailing Neil Shicoff, as Don José; Ildebrando d'Arcangelo as Escamillo; and Andrea Rost as Micaëla. Music director Andrew Davis conducts.
The company's season will include new productions of Verdi's Rigoletto, Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice, Puccini's Manon Lescaut, and Michael Tippett's The Midsummer Marriage.
Tippett's 1955 opera, directed by Peter Hall and conducted by Davis, will make its Lyric premiere during the composer's centenary year.
Revivals include Rossini's La Cenerentola, with Vesselina Kasarova and Juan Diego Flórez making his Lyric debut; Mozart's The Magic Flute, with Jonathan Lemalu in his Lyric debut; and Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier, with Susan Graham.
The new production of Rigoletto, directed by Stefano Viziolo, replaces a five-year-old Christopher Alden staging. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Alden's sexually explicit production drew dozens of complaints from Lyric subscribers. By contrast, a press release from the company describes the Viziolo version as "new but traditional."
Orfeo ed Euridice is directed by Robert Carson; countertenor David Daniels stars. The new staging of Manon Lescaut is directed by Olivier Tambosi and conducted by Bruno Bartoletti, the Lyric's artistic director emeritus; Karita Mattila sings the title role.
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