Robert Maher

Verdi’s IL TROVATORE again storms the Met stage in a star-studded, anvil-wielding cast , including Sondra Radvanovsky, Dolora Zajick and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. Marcelo Álvarez sings Manrico, the troubadour of the title. The story is well-known already: The gypsy Azucena has harbored a grudge for thirty years, but she is about to have revenge at last. Meanwhile, her son Manrico is in love with Leonora, but so is his arch-enemy, the Count Di Luna. A pot-boiler, where every tune is a hit.

Three old men in one Chicago nursing home are enjoying a carefree life and Michelle, their art teacher and friend, doesn't have a slightest idea about their gangster past in Capone's organization. When Dagmar Speer, sinister European art collector, comes to harass them about a mysterious object, they must remember the gangland deal that had gone bad more than sixty years ago.

Giuseppe Verdi's masterpiece calls for 4 great singers: one weak link and the whole may collapse. The Metropolitan Opera assembled a quartet of stars for this new production by David McVickar: Sondra Radvanovsky, Marcelo Álvarez, Dolora Zajick, and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. The opera - about mistaken identities and hair-raising bloody revenge - could hardly receive a better performance.