Word: barbers
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...list of who got there early is impressive. For her, there were no years on the slow track, working in small European houses. Instead she was launched by TV, on a show called Fantastico. Managers began calling, and she made her operatic debut in The Barber of Seville in Rome. It was an unusual instance where the singer was the same age as the insouciant heroine. "When I sang Rosina at 20," she says, "I knew I felt like Rosina." In 1987 she appeared on French TV in a tribute to Maria Callas, reeling off the finale of La Cenerentola...
...false dawn when Howard Hanson's Merry Mount and Deems Taylor's The King's Henchman, among other worthy pieces, took the stage at the Met only to disappear soon after. A few decades later, composers such as Douglas Moore (Baby Doe), Robert Ward (The Crucible) and Samuel Barber (Vanessa) made another attempt to establish American opera, but their works faded as well...
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street...
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street is rarely attempted by amateurs. Like all Stephen Sondheim musicals it has tricky lyrics, complex orchestrations and a plot that's more than a little strange. Three hours spent watching a barber who cuts people's throats and a baker who turns the corpses into meat pies may make some audience members queasy. Sweeney Todd is by far the most operatic and most complex of Sondheim's shows. The production currently at the Loeb Ex is a brilliant reminder why the show is one of his best...
David Travis demonstrates amazing range as Todd, the ex-convict barber who seeks revenge on the men who destroyed his life. Travis manages to show Todd's intensity without letting the character slip into melodrama. Travis portrays Todd's inhumanely violent nature yet also his sincere despair over the loss of his wife and daughter. Travis' many musical numbers show off his terrific voice and his acting at its best. Like most of the cast he seems underdirected in straight dialogue scenes--particularly in the first...