Renée Fleming Dishes With Barbara Walters About Super Bowl Gig

Elizabeth Futral Answers Questions Before Making Portland Debut

"How did you get involved in opera? I started piano lessons when I was five, and I always loved music. My mom was a classically trained pianist and flutist, and my dad was a minister. She gave me a lot of the classics and he gave me his stage presence. He also has a beautiful natural singing voice. I grew up in Louisiana near New Orleans. I ended up going to a small Baptist university in Alabama…and had a wonderful mentor, my first voice teacher, Eleanor Owsley, who was the one who really encouraged me. She had the vision for me…she’s been a great friend over all these years. Then I went to Indiana University in Bloomington to graduate school, which is the big opera factory of the Midwest. It’s a huge music school and they have a really big opera program. From there, I went to Chicago’s Young Artists Program, and afterwards I just stayed there. I kind of kept going through the doors that were open to me, and they luckily were opened, and I had good activities along the way. I’m very fortunate." [Source] Read the full interview by clicking here.

Kim Kardashian Attending Vienna Opera Ball In February

"Kim Kardashian is headed to Austria! Kanye West's other half will be attending the annual Vienna Opera Ball next month. The gala will take place on Feb. 27 at Vienna's State Opera House. The 33-year-old Keeping Up With the Kardashians star and new mom will be the guest of Austrian director and producer Wolfgang Santner. Santner, 44, tweeted this morning, '@WolfgangSantner: Bringing @KimKardashian to the #world #famous #Opera #Ball in #Vienna #Happy #Ballroom #Dancing.' Kim retweeted the post, adding, 'Can't wait!' Santner replied, '@KimKardashian You will be the #princess in this #fairy #tale! It is sooo #beautiful.' The Vienna Opera Ball, which is usually held on the Thursday preceding Ash Wednesday, is one of the highlights of the Viennese carnival season and has been held each year since 1935." [Source]

Famous August Sings Carmen "Habanera" Video Gets Selected

The original video posted on YouTube by August Schram a year ago has garnered nearly 1 million page views. It was chosen as an "Official Selection" in the Shorts Competition at the Sundance Film Festival 2014 and has won countless accolades at other festivals in other countries. From their website: "George Bizet`s 'Habanera' from Carmen has been reinterpreted and enhanced with electronic sounds for MeTube, a homage to thousands of ambitious YouTube users and video bloggers, and gifted and less gifted self-promoters on the Internet. About the Director: Daniel Moshel was born in 1976 in Offenbach am Main, Germany. During his multimedia studies, he directed the short film komA. In 2003, he founded the production company Moshel Film. In 2009, he produced the short film Der Doppelgänger, which was directed by Stephanie Winter. The film won the Excellence Award at the Busan International Short Film Festival. Login 2 Life (2011) was his first feature-length documentary. MeTube: August Sings Carmen 'Habanera' is his first music video." [Source] Cast, credits, and the video, are all after the jump. Remember, you can't un-see after you have watched it. For more information and photos, click here.

Fred Plotkin Examines Christa Ludwig's Golden Career For WQXR

(Photo: Ernst Kainerstorfer/ORF)

"Ludwig was born in Berlin on March 10, 1928 and grew up in Aachen. Her parents were singers and her mother was her first teacher. Her father became a stage director and manager. She grew up in the milieu of music and theater and absorbed it all. When Ludwig was seven, she heard her mother sing in Elektra and Fidelio conducted by a young Herbert von Karajan. Germany soon fell under Nazism and then came the horrors of World War II. When she was 16, her family home was destroyed by bombs. After her nation lost the war, Ludwig sang for American GIs in exchange for cigarettes, which were valuable as currency when money was worthless. Christa Ludwig was able to understand the awfulness of war and allow her emotional development to deepen without being derailed from her goals. She kept learning music, reading literature, thinking about characters. When German opera houses reopened in 1946, they needed good singers and few were in supply. Ludwig, at 18, was talented, attractive, tall and well-prepared. She was in the right place at the right time. She sang Orlovsky in Die Fledermaus in Frankfurt and was on her way, ultimately to Vienna, where she became a beloved star." [Source]

Moroccan-born Rapper French Montana Is Not A Fan Of Opera

"Not everyone's stoked about the opera singer who's booked to sing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl ... especially rapper French Montana who tells TMZ Sports, 'F**k that sh*t.' People have been divided about the decision to have renowned soprano Renee Flemming [sic] belt out the anthem before the big game on Feb 2 ... and Montana says he understands it's important to try something different. But at the end of the day, French says he's entitled to own opinion ... and his opinion is that opera music SUCKS." [Source] Watch the video of the rapper by clicking here. This all seems so ironic considering he and Maria Callas share the same taste in fur coats.

Anna Netrebko's New York Apartment Has Plenty To Love

Anna Netrebko, wearing Oscar de la Renta, sits in the "Diva Chair" from Mackenzie-Childs with a painting by SoHo artist Hulbert Waldroup in the background on Beaujolais-colored walls. Read the full New York Times story by clicking here. (Photo: Fred R. Conrad)

Diana Damrau Live At Le Poisson Rouge March 27 In NYC

Following on the heels of a night of Russian exoticism featuring Anna Netrebko, soprano Diana Damrau will perform at Le Poisson Rouge on March 24, 2014 at 7:30 PM. No word on whether the theme will be Bavarian. Purchase tickets by clicking here. During March, the coloratura is in town singing La Sonnambula at the Metropolitan Opera and a concert at Carnegie Hall with Zubin Mehta. The little New York City village hot spot Le Poisson Rouge is becoming a regular hangout for stars of the MET. In addition to the most recent concert that also featured Ildar Abdrazakov and Anita Rachvelishvili, past performers have included Iestyn Davies, Joseph Kaiser, Kathleen Kim, and Patricia Racette. To learn more about Diana Damrau, visit her website by clicking here.

Éva Marton International Singing Competition Accepting Applications

Click here to start filling out the application. Grand-prize winner will walk away with 15,000€. Start brushing up on your Liszt, it's part of the audition requirements. Good luck!

Remembering Maestro Claudio Abbado And His Opera Stars

Claudio Abbado backstage with Renata Scotto after I Capuleti e i Montecchi at Teatro alla Scala in 1967

Conductor Claudio Abbado passed away on Monday, January 20, 2014, at the age of 80. He left an immaculate legacy of live musical performances and countless recordings on a variety of labels. He conducted a great majority of opera throughout his career and subsequently had many friendships with singers from around the globe. Check out some spectacular photos of the Maestro with singers from the past 50 years, along with some biographical information, after the jump.

Kiri Te Kanawa Celebrates Over 50 Years Of Recording

"New Zealand soprano comes up with a staid celebration of 50 years in the recording studio. Te Kanawa's creamy lyric soprano was not made to evoke the malevolent sea monsters of Te Taniwha. Max Cryer's liner notes for Dame Kiri Te Kanawa's Waiata make an engaging read. He provides another succinct introduction to the thorny issue of "Maori song" (as he did for Te Kanawa's 1999 Maori Songs) followed by notes on individual tracks. This is a celebration of the soprano's half-century recording career, enlisting the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and the University of Auckland Chamber Choir, in arrangements by Carl (Piano by Candlelight) Doy. In time for Christmas, Waiata is an unabashed stocking-stuffer, offering minimal rewards for those with a respect for the achievements of this singer. Beside it, her earlier Maori Songs CD, which occasioned a few giggles and squirms in its time, takes on classic status. It had stronger songs and Te Kanawa's voice was 14 years younger. Its ethnic trimmings of kapa haka groups (including Mahinarangi Tocker and George Henare) and a wash of taonga puoro now seem positively piquant. Waiata is a staid affair. Doy's arrangements have fleeting moments of inspiration, with a few impressive Mantovani string clusters, but tinkling piano and churning rhythmic ostinati try the patience, along with overlooked production glitches."[Source] In addition to the new release of Waiata by Sony (set globally for March 2014), other labels such as Warner Classics (featuring former EMI Classics material) and Decca (featuring former Philips Classics material) are reissuing box-sets of their own to commemorate the occasion. Check out the beautiful editions after the jump. 

When Joseph Calleja Met The Leader Of The Free World

(Photo: White House)

"Joseph Calleja meeting US President Barack Obama after he performed at the Kennedy Centre Honors last month in tribute to American soprano Martina Arroyo. The tenor is currently appearing at the Metropolitan Opera in New York before moving on to London for a seven-performance run of Faust at the Royal Opera House and a solo concert at the Royal Festival Hall." [Source]

Did Anna Netrebko And Mercedes Bass Get A Contact High?

Netrebko and Bass post-concert at
Le Poisson Rouge (Photo: Facebook)

"They say the old culture-world distinction between uptown and downtown New York has vanished, but on Wednesday evening at Le Poisson Rouge, the Greenwich Village basement club, it still felt like a meeting of two disparate domains. There was delicious incongruence between the sight of Mercedes Bass, the Metropolitan Opera’s elegantly coifed vice chairwoman, and the unmistakable scent of marijuana just a few feet away. Ms. Bass and cannabis had descended the stairs for the latest in a series of concerts presented by the Met in collaboration with the indie-hip, intimate Le Poisson Rouge. The program, 'Russian Exoticism and ‘Prince Igor,’' was offered as a kind of promotion for the Met’s new production of 'Igor,' the Borodin masterpiece, which opens Feb. 6." [Source]

MET Soprano Sharleen Joynt Receives First Rose On "The Bachelor"

Basking in the Sun: TV contestant on America's most popular dating television show (Photo: Andrea Joynt) 

"It’s a long way from the Metropolitian Opera in New York and European opera houses to TV’s The Bachelor but Ottawa singer Sharleen Joynt has made the journey. The 29 year-old soprano is taking it all in stride after appearing in the premiere episode of the ABC-TV reality series Monday night and attracting the attention of Juan Pablo Galavis, the hunk who is this season’s single man. In the beginning of the season, 27 women are hoping to win the heart of the 32-year-old former soccer player and single dad originally from Venezuela. Joynt was one of 18 women handed a rose by Juan Pablo on Monday. But by most accounts the exchange was a little forced. 'I guess I thought I would feel more of this instant chemistry than I did. I guess I feel a little distraught,' she is reported to have said after laying eyes on Juan Pablo." [Source

Juan Pablo Galavis seems under the spell of soprano Sharleen Joynt (Photo: Rick Rowell/ABC)

"'Silvery'-voiced coloratura soprano Sharleen Joynt has been 'sparking audience enthusiasm' with her 'special and unexpected amber timbre', 'a vocal range that is second to none', her 'scintillating stage presence', and her 'love for taking risks'. Sharleen's 2013/14 Season includes rejoining the Metropolitan Opera roster to cover Fiakermilli in R. Strauss' Arabella. She also appears with the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe, Theater und Orchester Heidelberg, Theater St. Gallen in Switzerland, and makes her France debut. For the 2012/13 Season Sharleen spent her second year as an ensemble member of the Theater und Orchester Heidelberg, performing Blonde in Die Entführung aus dem Serail and receiving critical acclaim for her 'stratospheric' Soprano 1/Ariadne in Wolfgang Rihm's Dionysos. She also made both a role and house debut with the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe as Marie in La Fille du Régiment. Her uncommonly honest embodiment of characters and fearless

Let's Hear It For The Boys: New Kaufmann, Abdrazakov, Cencic

Sumi Jo Counts Italy As Her Second Home For Over 30 Years

In an interview with Il Tempo, Sumi Jo discusses her life-long love of Italy. After attending Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia she quickly ascended to performing Un Ballo in Maschera with Plácido Domingo and Herbert von Karajan. She discusses her love of Rome, advice from Maestro von Karajan, Koreans in Italy, music education in the country, and her favorite roles. Read the full interview here.