La Traviata

Opera's love affair with love--and with glamour--must make it seem a perfect art form for Valentine's Day. And L.A. Opera took advantage on Sunday by opening its new production of Verdi's "La Traviata," the work that best symbolizes the power of a love able to surmount the glitter of the 19th century Parisian demimonde. The Dorothy Chandler Pavilion was full of couples--as it normally is at opera time, if not always so smoochy.

Times music critic Mark Swed reviews the new L.A. Opera production of Verdi's "La Traviata."

She's been the voice of Betty Rubble on "The Flintstones" and hundreds of other goofy cartoon characters. Now, four-octave soprano B.J. Ward is having an animated good time with opera. Ward's live, one-woman show, "Stand-Up Opera," combines serious operatic renditions with a comedy routine that includes punch lines, pratfalls and an updated spin on the classics.

A fiasco at its premiere in Venice in 1853, Verdi's "La Traviata" has nevertheless become virtually foolproof. Little wonder. Give us a reasonably sensitive Violetta and a reasonably sensitive conductor, and it doesn't take much else for the drama of the good-hearted courtesan who sacrifices herself for love to break some hearts.

A fiasco at its premiere in Venice in 1853, Verdi's "La Traviata" has nevertheless become virtually foolproof. Little wonder. Give us a reasonably sensitive Violetta and a reasonably sensitive conductor, and it doesn't take much else for the drama of the good-hearted courtesan who sacrifices herself for love to break some hearts.

When New York City Opera established its touring National Company in 1979, Renata Scotto was reigning queen at the city's preeminent company, Metropolitan Opera. The touring arm began with a twofold mandate to take opera to communities around the country and to provide young artists with performing experience; its first production was "La Traviata."

A new orchestra's inaugural season is, necessarily, one packed with firsts. Last weekend, the new New West Symphony, in collaboration with Opera San Jose, made its first foray into the wonderful, irrational world of opera, with its presentation of "La Traviata." The results: generally pleasing and sometimes moving.

The cast in a new production of Verdi's "La Traviata," opening Friday at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre, is like no other. It looks like Los Angeles. The rich mix of ethnicities is a dream come true for Korean opera singer Philip Roh, who has long sought to use music as a vehicle to improve race relations. "I think Los Angeles has all the ingredients to make the idea work," said baritone Roh, 43, founder of the Los Angeles Hanmi Opera Company.

The cast in a new production of Verdi's "La Traviata," opening Friday at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre, is like no other. It looks like Los Angeles. The rich mix of ethnicities is a dream come true for Korean opera singer Philip Roh, who has long sought to use music as a vehicle to improve race relations. "I think Los Angeles has all the ingredients to make the idea work," said baritone Roh, 43, founder of the Los Angeles Hanmi Opera Company.

Every opera company has its special days and its business-as-usual days. Often as not, the business-as-usual days involve the hum-along delights and pretty pathos of Verdi's "La Traviata." And so it was Saturday at the San Francisco Opera. The performance wasn't bad enough to be annoying. Unfortunately, it wasn't good enough to be memorable. San Francisco cranked out Verdi's nearly indestructible masterpiece, virtually and literally, by the numbers.