Opera in New York
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OPERA IN NEW YORK APRIL 2-14, 2021 TOUR LEADER: CLIVE PAGET OKSANA DYKA JOYCE DIDONATO JAKUB HRŮŠA SONYA YONCHEVA YANNICK NÉZET-SÉGUIN PIOTR BECZALA OPERA IN Overview NEW YORK Sonya Yoncheva, Joyce di Donato, Piotr Beczala, Oksana Dyka and more – April 2021 sees a star-studded line up of performers at Tour dates: April 2-14, 2021 New York’s Metropolitan Opera, unrivalled by any other opera company anywhere in the world in the 2020-21 season. Tour leader: Clive Paget Academy Travel is delighted to offer lovers of vocal music a 13-day Tour Price: $11,140 per person, twin share program that includes six outstanding performances at the Met, as well as a performance at the world-famous Carnegie Hall. We’ve secured seats Single Supplement: $2,640 for sole use of for all performances in the Metropolitan Opera’s Grand Tier, in our view double room the best seats in the theatre for acoustics and sightlines. Booking deposit: $4,500 per person The performance program is complemented by visits to a select range of small galleries and museums around the city, background talks on the Recommended airline: Qantas performances, and plenty of time to relax and enjoy New York during your tour. Tour leader Clive Paget will provide the background talks and expert Maximum places: 20 insight into the cultural life of New York. This tour also employs local expert guidance at some of the best galleries and attractions that New Itinerary: New York (11 nights), with 6 York has to offer. Academy Travel has conducted long-stay tours to New performances at the Metropolitan Opera and a York since 2007. We have a thorough and up-to-date knowledge of the concert at Carnegie Hall key cultural attractions of the city, and we’ve specially curated a program designed to show you the best of the city by day and by night. Date published: May 13, 2020 Accommodation is in spacious Premier Plus rooms at the Warwick Hotel in midtown New York. The Warwick is close to restaurants, cafes and a number of museums and historical sites. Your tour leader Clive Paget is a New York-based arts writer and critic and is currently Editor at Large for Australia’s Limelight magazine. He began his 25-year arts career as an opera and musical theatre singer in London before moving into directing and dramaturgy. Relocating to Sydney, he transitioned into classical music retail before moving into arts journalism. His knowledge of music and music history is encyclopaedic, with a special passion for the ways in which music has always been linked to parallel socio-political and artistic movements. Clive’s academic career started with a BSc from Imperial College in Enquiries London where he first began to develop his passion for classical music. and bookings As a co-founder of influential new music powerhouse, The Bridewell Theatre, his directing credits included the 1997 world premiere of Stephen For further information and to Sondheim’s first professional musical, Saturday Night, as well, as secure a place on this tour important premieres by composers like Adam Guettel, Jason Robert Brown and Michael John LaChiusa. In 2002, he moved to London’s please contact Lynsey Jenkins National Theatre as Sir Nicholas Hytner’s music theatre consultant, a role at Academy Travel on 9235 he fulfilled for five years initiating new projects and bringing together 0023 or 1800 639 699 (outside contemporary arts practitioners from Jonathan Dove to Damon Albarn and Sydney) or email Akram Khan. [email protected] Six Performances at the met DVORAK’S GOUNOD’S VERDI’S RUSALKA ROMÉO ET JULIETTE NABUCCO A dream team delivers this Nadine Sierra and Benjamin Oksana Dyka leads this much thrilling score, including Sonya Bernheim star in this classic anticipated return of Verdi’s Yoncheva, Piotr Beczala and combination of grand early career hit. Czech conductor Jakub Hrůša French opera and in his Met debut. Shakespearean drama. MOZART’S HEGGIE’S PUCCINI’S DON GIOVANNI DEAD MAN LA BOHÈME Tony Award-winning Ivo van WALKING Franco Zeffirelli’s remarkable Hove makes his Met debut with One of the most successful Met production is an undisputed a new production of Mozart’s contemporary operas, Jake classic of the modern operatic dark ‘drama giocosa’. Heggie’s masterpiece makes it stage, starring Angel Blue Met debut with Joyce di Donato as Mimi. and Latonia Moore Act II of Puccini's "La Bohème" Detailed itinerary Included meals are shown with the symbols B, L and D. Tour start & finish time The tour begins at 6.00pm on Friday March 6, 2020, at the Warwick Hotel New York. The tour ends after breakfast on Tuesday March 17, 2020, at the Warwick Hotel. Friday April 2 Arrive New York Meet your tour leader and fellow tour participants over welcome drinks and finger food in our hotel, and have an introductory talk on the upcoming performances and New York’s cultural landscape. Saturday April 3 Midtown – Don Giovanni This morning we start with a guided tour of the historical and architectural landmarks of New York’s Midtown district, starting Above: a production image of the Metropolitan Opera’s Don Giovanni at the incredible Art Deco masterpiece, the Rockefeller Center, then continuing on to other architectural highlights such as Below: Gustav Klimt’s celebrated portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, “The Lever House, the Seagram Building, St Patrick’s Cathedral, the Woman in Gold” and centrepiece of the Neue Galerie General Electric Building and grand stores of 5th Avenue. After a welcome lunch, Clive guides us through tonight’s opera, Mozart’s Don Giovanni. Based on the legendary story of Don Juan, this classic of the Mozart canon blends the light-hearted comic opera with a work that is serious and introspective. Considered one the of the greatest operas, this new production by Tony-award winning director Ivo van Hove is an exciting new take and a perfect start to our operatic line-up. (B, L) Performance details Venue: Metropolitan Opera Program: Mozart, Don Giovanni Performers: Ailyn Pérez (Donna Anna), Isabel Leonard (Donna Elvira), Hera Hyesang Park (Zerlina), Ben Bliss (Don Ottavio), Peter Mattei (Don Giovanni), Yannick Nézet-Séguin (conductor) Sunday April 4 Neue Galerie & Central Park The Neue Galerie, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, was established by the art dealer Serge Sabarsky and the art-loving entrepreneur Ronald S Lauder. The collection focuses on early 20th-century painting and decorative arts from Vienna, and its centrepiece is Gustav Klimt’s portrait of Adele Bloch Bauer, subject of the recent film, The Woman in Gold. Our before-hours tour will also include an excellent visiting exhibition of early 20th-century art. This afternoon we stroll through Central Park, once dubbed ‘the largest work of art in New York’, for the remarkable landscaping by Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted. Alternatively, you might like to catch a Sunday matinee performance at Carnegie Hall or a Broadway theatre. (B) Monday April 5 Downtown – Nabucco This morning Clive provides an analysis of Verdi’s early-career opera, for which Verdi himself remarked "this is the opera with which my artistic career really begins. And though I had many difficulties to fight against, it is certain that Nabucco was born under a lucky star". The remainder of the day is free to explore as you wish, or to take an optional guided visit with your tour leader to New York’s Downtown, to see the World Trade Center and 9/11 Memorial, Trinity Church, Woolworth Building, Wall Street and the Financial District. Elijah Moshinsky’s production of Nabucco is a sumptuous revival of this seminal Verdi work, inspired by the Jewish scriptures and taking place amidst the destruction of the first temple of Jerusalem. Oksana Dyka takes the lead in this production, a singer who has been receiving excellent reviews for her recent performances, with an impressive cast of supporting baritones and basses to deliver this stirring early masterpiece. (B) Performance details Venue: Metropolitan Opera Program: Verdi, Nabucco Above: a production image of the Metropolitan Opera’s Nabucco Performers: Oksana Dyka (Abigaille), George Gagnidze (Nabucco), Varduhi Abrahamyan (Fenena) Najmiddin Mavlyanov (Ismaele), Marco Armiliato (conductor) Tuesday April 6 Below: the extraordinary interior of the JP Morgan library JP Morgan Library – Rusalka This morning we visit the magnificent collection of the JP Morgan Library. In 1903, banker JP Morgan commissioned Gilded Age architect Stanford White to design a Renaissance- style pavilion to hold his precious literary collection. Spending the equivalent of $900 million in today’s terms, Morgan acquired an unrivalled collection, ranging from ancient Mesopotamian tablets to illustrated manuscripts of the Middle Ages, some of the first and rarest printed books, music manuscripts and important documents of American history. After lunch in the Morgan restaurant, you’ll have the option to visit some other landmarks of Lower Midtown, including the Chrysler Building and Grand Central Station with your tour manager. In the early evening Clive does an introductory lecture to tonight’s much- anticipated performance of Rusalka. Exquisite Sonya Yoncheva stars as the water sprite who yearns to become human in order to find love—singing the sublime Song to the Moon in the process. This production by Mary Zimmerman excellently pairs Yoncheva with Piotr Beczała, conducted by Jakub Hrůša in his Metropolitan Opera debut. (B, L) Performance details Venue: Metropolitan Opera Program: Dvořák, Rusalka Performers: Sonya Yoncheva (Rusalka), Piotr Beczała (Prince), Eric Owens (Water Gnome) Ekaterina Gubanova (Foreign Princess), Jakub Hrůša (conductor) Wednesday April 7 Chelsea and the High Line – Carnegie Hall This morning we explore the fashionable Chelsea district, once an industrial area, but today teeming with art galleries, exclusive apartment buildings and the High Line, a former overhead industrial rail line turned into a remarkable public park.