March in Paris...

A selection of good operas & concerts to see in Paris in March 2010.

Salle Pleyel

• Mon 1 : The Year of Chopin cannot be better celebrated than by a series of concerts by today's famous pianists : nothing better than start it by a Pole, and not any - da best, Krystian Zimerman.
• Sat & Sun -  6, 7: Martha Argerich / Festival de Lugano for a highly eclectic program
• Wed 10:  Orchestre de Paris and Annette Dasch for a Richard Strauss' liederabend  
  
• Mon 15: Ingo Metzmacher [who --since the smashing War Requiem @ Pleyel-- became our top-fav] returns to Pleyel; this time with his Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester for a concert of Stravinsky and Beethoven (the latter =  Violin Concerto with Leonidas Kavakos the soloist)
• Tue 16: John Adams will lead the London Symphony Orchestra in an eclectic program including his own Black City
• Sun 21: A potentially interesting concert with Enrique Mazzola
  
• Fri 26: Hervé Niquet comes back to baroque; on the program Handel's Messiah, and the cast includes Rosemary Joshua
  
• Sat 27 & Sun 28: Two more passionate concerts with Brigitte Engerer and our fav Boris Berezovsky
• Mon 29: Juan Diego Florez will be back for his yearly recital in Paris. This time it won't be at TCE but Pleyel. 

Théatre des Champs-Elysées

• Tue 2: Last show of this run of Falstaff conducted by Daniele Gatti, and with a strong cast lead by Anthony Michaels-Moore and Anna Caterina Antonacci
• Mon 8: Julia Fischer will play a few Bach sonatas 
• Mon 15:  Diana Damrau comes back to TCE for her yearly recital there. This time it will be more cosy: no orchestra but one of the greatest lieder-pianist Helmut Deutsch; Songs by Liszt, Strauss and Rachmaninov
• Thu 18: Mikko Franck will conduct l'Orchestre National de France, the pianist Simon Trpceski and Olga Borodina in a more than appealing all-Russian program
• Fri 19 & Sat 20:  Handel Gala with Sandrine Piau, Marie-Nicole Lemieux, Philippe Jaroussky and Topi Lehtipuu (baroque fans are being spoiled this year - big time!)
  
• Wed 24: Philharmonia Orchestra is back [love them since that knockout performance of Wozzeck last October @ TCE]; this time they come with Riccardo Muti  for a full Beethoven night
• Fri 26: Olga Pasichnyk is coming back to Paris [one year after her memorable Roxana in Krol Roger!]; she's part of the cast in Gloria by Poulenc
  

Théâtre du Châtelet

• March 31  will be the day when a rarely staged opera by Scott Joplin Treemonisha will be premiered in this pretty theater. Notice a special participation of Grace Bumbry!

Opéra national de Paris - Opéra Bastille

• March 2, 5, 8, 12, 14: Still time to see good old Graham Vick's production of Don Carlo with a superb cast: Stefano Secco, Luciana D'Intino, Sondra Radvanovsky, Ludovic Tézier.
• March 4, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25 and 28: The Paris Ring opens with Das Rheingold. A new production directed by Günter Krämer will be extra interesting because of the phenomenal young conductor - Philippe Jordan. Excellent cast too...
  
• March 26, and 30: Coline Serreau's production of Il Barbiere di Siviglia returns: again with Antonino Siragusa, Paata Burchuladze, Dalibor Jenis and Isabel Leonard Karine Deshayes.

Opéra national de Paris - Palais Garnier

• March 17, 20, 23, 29, and 31: Philippe Fénelon's Faust, a new opera with an unoriginal name and hopefully interesting cast.
  
• March 26: Sophie Koch - recital with Philippe Jordan leading the Orchestra of the Paris Opera.

Opéra Comique 

• March 2, 4, and 6: Dan Jemmett's production of Béatrice et Bénédict with Christine Rice, Allan Clayton, Edwin Crossley-Mercer , Élodie Méchain will finish its run.
• March 15, 17, 19, and 21: L'Amant jaloux a pretty 18th century opera by André-Ernest-Modeste Grétry, conducted by Jérémie Rhorer. The cast includes Frédéric Antoun and Magali Léger
• March 16, and 18: Zémire et Azor is a short comic opera by André-Ernest-Modeste Grétry, an event to resonate with all-Grétry-month. Zémire et Azor actually stands for The Beauty and the Beast and Berlioz loved it.

Cité de la Musique

• March 2: Elisabeth Leonskaja together with Philharmonia Quartett Berlin will play the works by  Haydn, Janacek, Schumann
  
• March 8, 10, and 12: Le Nozze di Figaro, concert version, performed by the students of Conservatoire de Paris
• March 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 14: The whole Chopin Opus will be performed by various pianists. Check out the program!
• March 12: Ensemble intercontemporain, BBC singers and Pierre Boulez. Goooood!
• March 13: Le Bourgeois gentilhomme by Lully and R.Strauss (??) + Barbara Bonney singing 7 songs by Berg
• March 20: The first performance in France of the John Adams' opera A Flowering Tree, with the composer in the audience, and an interesting cast to discover
• March 26: Recital with Sally Matthews - songs by Ives, Barber, Stravinsky and Adams

Musée d'Orsay

• March 11 & 14: Soloists of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra who call themselves Scharoun Ensemble, will come for two concerts: 1st French (Ravel & Debussy), 2nd German ( Brahms & Schubert)
• Tue 16: Salomé Haller and Christoph Eschenbach for a Schubertian Liederabend.

Salle Gaveau

• March 16  François Chaplin, an excellent French pianist will perform the works by Chopin, Fauré, Scriabin and Rachmaninov
• March 24  Max Emanuel Cencic is back for his yearly recital in Paris. This time the program of the "castrati" arias.