When Samuel Barber’s Vanessa premiered in New York in 1958 it was the first new American work to appear at the Metropolitan Opera in eleven years, and only the twentieth since the house was opened in ...

WILLIAMSTOWN — Joshua Jeremiah leaned in, as if to share a secret. “I’m the troublemaker,” the topknotted baritone told me, eyes flashing. It wasn’t a secret at all. Already he’d hopped up to ...

The introduction of American composer Samuel Barber’s riveting first opera, “Vanessa,” was marked by uncommon splendor: It had its premiere by the venerable Metropolitan Opera in January 1958, won a ...

The opera of this year’s Spoleto Festival USA is Vanessa, an existential drama that follows its titular character through a harrowing journey of love, longing and loss. It’s historically important to ...

Music by Samuel Barber. Libretto by Gian Carlo Menotti. Premiere: January 15, 1958, Metropolitan Opera, New York City. Sung in English. January 16, 1958, the morning after Samuel Barber’s Vanessa ...

NORTH ADAMS — The team behind “Vanessa” said they hoped another character in this underperformed opera by Samuel Barber would come to the fore. With a large expressive sound that came out of nowhere, ...

For more than nine decades, the Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcasts have brought opera into millions of homes, playing a vital and unparalleled role in the development and appreciation of opera in ...

But the work gradually faded from view, mostly owing to the shortcomings of Gian Carlo Menotti's overly melodramatic libretto, which unfolds in a Northern European country in 1905 and tells the story ...

An American opera focused on three generations of women, who confront society's intrusions into their secluded world. Vanessa is a high voltage drama of exquisite character detailing. Samuel Barber ...