News & Reviews

By Anne Midgette Among opera companies, putting on musicals is all the rage. There are, the companies assure us, plenty of artistic reasons to do it: Musicals are the contemporary equivalent of opera, or musicals are a historical successor to opera that opera houses...

By John Shulson Verdi’s “La Traviata” ranks among the top 10 most done and seen operas in the repertoire. Based on “The Lady of the Camellias” by Alexandre Dumas, “Traviata" is the typical tale of the power and pain of love. Violetta is the high society courtesan who...

By Roy Proctor | Special correspondent Virginia Opera’s new take on the world’s most-often produced opera is vocally and instrumentally sumptuous, to be sure, but Verdi’s “La Traviata” at the Carpenter Theatre opens with a visual stunner that will take your breath...

By Rich Griset Preview: Virginia Opera’s “La Traviata” explores a timeless story of forbidden love. Lucid Frame Productions Cecilia Lopez as Violetta and Rolando Sanz as Alfredo in “La Traviata,” based on a play adapted from a novel by Alexandre Dumas the younger. The...

By Terry Ponick With astonishing performances by Cecilia Violetta López and Malcolm MacKenzie, Virginia Opera's current production of Verdi's tuneful, tragic masterpiece is a genuine three-hankie surprise. Young soprano Cecilia Violetta López astonishes as Violetta in...

By Joan Reinthaler The Virginia Opera has a fine “La Traviata” on its hands. Verdi’s sad but sumptuous opera opened Saturday for two performances at George Mason University’s Center for the Arts. And while soprano Cecilia Violetta Lopez’s Violetta may have carried the...

By David Siegel Be smitten with Violetta, the brave woman who learns that “love can be inspired by a passing glance,” but happiness is not such an easy journey. This is the grand sweep of Verdi’s “La Traviata,” the world’s most performed opera, coming to the Center...

By Sarah Kingsley To close the season, Virginia Opera premieres a brand new traditional staging of La Traviata, directed by Lilian Groag. A classic Italian opera composed by one of the masters of the art form – Giuseppe Verdi – La Traviata is the most performed opera...

By B. J. Atkinson - The Virginian-Pilot When an opera production's a hit, especially one in which the plot hinges on antiquated mores, there's more going on than pretty music. The director must bring the tale into the 21st century, involve us and make us care. Lillian...

By Craig Shapiro - The Virginian-Pilot NO OTHER OPERA in the world was staged more often the last five seasons. It figures prominently in the Julia Roberts movie "Pretty Woman." And Virginia Opera is putting it on for the seventh time, capping the company's 40th...