Photo Flashback: Leona Mitchell, Renata Scotto, Virginia Zeani, Tito Capobianco

Power Quartet: Tito Capobianco, Leona Mitchell, Virginia Zeani, and Renata Scotto, post-recital in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on February 22, 2014. Details of the evening are after the jump. (Photo: Venetian Arts Society/Facebook)

Verdi Makes Appearance In 2006 Curious George Film

"Ms. Plushbottom, Ted's neighbor, wanted her apartment painted like a picture of the Opera Hall. The painters only painted three colors on the wall. The colors on the wall were blue, red, and yellow. Mrs. Plushbottom was voiced by Joan Plowright, who starred in films such as Dennis the Menace (1993) and 101 Dalmatians (1996)." After firing the painters, the diva decides to soak in the tub while opera plays throughout the apartment. Watch the video clip from Curious George: Show Me The Monkey (2006) that features the cabaletta "Tutto sprezzo che d'Ernani" from Ernani by Giuseppe Verdi, as well as a clip of Leona Mitchell singing the full aria from the Metropolitan Opera, after the jump. [Source, Source] 

Is Michelle Johnson The Next Great African-American Star?

"Io son l'umile ancella"
Adriana Lecouvreur (Cilea)

"Ms. Johnson seems to have the vocal goods as well as star power," wrote The New York Times about the 28-year old soprano who last week won a $15,000 prize at the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Grand Finals concert in New York. Michelle Johnson hails from Pearland, Texas, and has received degrees from New England Conservatory of Music and Boston University. She is a former member of the Young Artist Programs of Opera Theatre of St. Louis and Opera Tampa, as well as participating in the International Institute of Vocal Arts (Chiari, Italy), Tanglewood Music Center and the Music Academy of the West. Winning important competitions since 2006, she is currently a third-year artist resident at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia. Her repertoire includes the title role in Suor Angelica, Countess in Capriccio, Leonora in Il Trovatore, Alice Ford in Falstaff, Monisha in Treemonisha, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and Countess Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro. She is clearly a singer on the rise destined to have contracts floated her way from companies all around the world, surely it is the moment of a lifetime. Let's hope it is not fleeting.

Looking back at a dozen African-American sopranos over the last three decades that have been in Ms. Johnson's position and were hailed as the new great singer to take up the mantle of the lyric, spinto or dramatic repertoire, somehow they have lacked staying power to reach the heights that Marian Anderson forged the groundwork for 56 years ago and that Leontyne Price cemented as the standard for performance. Ms. Johnson will have to work hard in order to have a career that lasts more than a debut at the Metropolitan Opera and remain a household name. [Source, Source, Source]

Wilhelmenia Fernandez "Ebben? ne andrò lontana" La Wally (Catalani)	Carmen Balthrop "Che sento? Oh Dio!" Giulio Cesare (Händel)	Indra Thomas "Pace, pace mio Dio" La Forza del Destino (Verdi)
Marvis Martin "Glück das mir verblieb" Die tote Stadt (Korngold)*	Cynthia Haymon "Signore, ascolta" Turandot (Puccini)	Angela Brown "Ecco l'orrido campo" Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi)
Michele Crider "Vissi d'arte, vissi d'amore" Tosca (Puccini)	Cynthia Clarey "My Man's Gone Now" Porgy & Bess (Gershwin)	Leona Mitchell "Ernani, involami" Ernani (Verdi)
Faye Robinson "Quel guardo il cavaliere" Don Pasquale (Donizetti)	Jonita Lattimore "Canción de amor" (Villa-Lobos)	Measha Brueggergosman "D'Oreste, d'Ajace" Idomeneo (Mozart)

*bonus: second clip will automatically play "Io son l'umile ancella" Adriana Lecouvreur (Cilea)

Contact High: Leona Mitchell

Manon Lescaut - "In quelle trine morbide"
Leona Mitchell
Japan, mid-90s
Clip length (0:55)


con·tact high [kon-takt hahy]: when you feel the slight, brief sensation of being high just because you were close to somebody that was definitely high.