Word: stupenda
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...usually called the Pig." But more than anyone else, it was a 33-year-old Australian, 225 years later, who put Alcina center stage. Joan Sutherland's stupendous stamina and strength in Franco Zeffirelli's 1960 production at La Fenice not only earned her the title of La Stupenda but single-handedly brought this neglected opera back into the repertoire. Since being snapped up by New York's Metropolitan Opera for its young artists' development program in 2001, Perth-born Durkin, 31, has been groomed for world stardom. Despite a closer resemblance to Joan Collins than Sutherland, Durkin's Metropolitan...
...perhaps forgetting La Stupenda here. While Durkin admits that Sutherland's perfectly controlled career and "beautiful, bell-like sound" have been inspirations for her own stupendous rise, comparisons can also be unhelpful. She would be the first to point out that she has yet to make a recording or grace the European opera stages that forged Sutherland's fame. But in the budding boldness of her bel canto one can already sense a magical symmetry forming-of another down-to-earth spirit allied to a heavenly voice...
...made her operatic debut there in Offenbach's Tales of Hoffmann. "The designer is even making my costumes smaller so the scale is right." Then she added, "What you need now is an opera house." She grew more conciliatory later, after an audience of 1,547 acclaimed La Stupenda rapturously at the opera's end, pelting her with 600 red roses specially sent to chilly Sydney from Holland for the occasion...
...else but Adler could persuade Prima Donna Joan Sutherland to brave both the crowd and the city's infamous outdoor air-conditioning and sing Ah fors' è lui and Sempre libera from Verdi's La Traviata? Introduced by his Honor Joseph Alioto, the statuesque ("La Stupenda"), redheaded Joan beamed upon her vast audience and remarked with her familiar air of Aussie nononsense: "The mayor's already told you what I'm going to sing, so I might as well get on with...
...Stupenda really got on with it a few nights later as the star of opening night's new production of Bellini's bel canto classic Norma. Though Sutherland did not warm up until after her cruel Act I setpiece Casta Diva, she has rarely sung as passionately or been so actively involved in the dramatic proceedings. Under Tito Capobianco's ingenious direction, Sutherland clearly dramatized the two sides of Norma's often enigmatic personality-severe and stately as the imperious high priestess of the Druids, yielding, even frantic as a woman in love with, and ready...