Alfie Boe admits there's a little bit of Alfie Boe in Rodolfo. He's played the role many times, under directors as distinguished as Sir David McVicar, Baz Luhrmann and Jonathan Miller. Here he describes how La Bohème and in particular the famous aria Che gelida manina has become a huge part of his life.
La Bohème
The story is set in Paris in the period around 1830. Act 1 - In the bohemians' garret, Christmas eve Marcello is painting while his friend, Rodolfo, a poet, gazes out of the window. They complain of the cold. In order to…
Why Opera?
Opera is an amazing art form – possibly the supreme art form, but what exactly is opera? First and foremost, it is the musical enactment of drama, so the people on stage need to be able to sing and act with equal measures…
Arabian opera nights
Architecture and opera came together at the end—and in the aftermath—of Frank Lloyd Wright’s career, but not in the manner that America’s most famous architect might have envisaged. Nor in the way, he…
Opera's hot in Chile
Santiago’s Teatro Municipal—one of the great opera houses of South America—celebrates its 150th anniversary this month. But the performance on 17 September 1857 of Verdi’s Ernani was by no means the first…
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