James Keolker

James Keolker is a professor of opera studies at the Fromm Institute at the University of San Francisco and is the author of an award-winning book on Puccini and his contemporaries.

Articles By This Author

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Review

Festival Opera's Triumphant Turandot

James Keolker - July 13, 2009

Everything about Puccini’s opera Turandot is big: big orchestra, big voices, big chorus, enormous sets, and massive emotions. So it is daring for a company the size of Festival Opera to undertake such a giant. But no need to worry, for this is a triumphant Turandot.

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Review

A Tepid Tosca

James Keolker - June 3, 2009
Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca has a fabled past at San Francisco Opera, with some 34 highly successful productions in the company’s 86-year history, and starring such imperious Toscas as Renata Tebaldi, Dorothy Kirsten, Leontyne Price, and Montserrat Caballé.
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Review

Puccini Perfection

James Keolker - November 18, 2008

Opera is a demanding art, requiring large forces dedicated to music, drama, and scenic design. And while it is often futile to expect all of these to be equally aligned, the theater gods seemed to be smiling Sunday afternoon for the current San Francisco Opera production of Puccini's La Bohème. In a word, it was perfection.

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Review

Daft Tale, Deftly Told

James Keolker - August 5, 2008
Some things in life are perfect and should never change.
Feature

A Stocking Full of DVDs

James Keolker - December 11, 2007
In the spirit of the season, following are a select handful of DVDs, those little boxes of superior performances and visual delights.
Review

A Victim of Virtue

James Keolker - December 4, 2007
The current San Francisco Opera production of Madama Butterfly is pure Puccini perfection. Casting, conducting, and stage design are so ideally aligned that this is one of the most satisfying productions that I have ever experienced. Foremost is the superior interpretation of Patricia Racette.
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Review

A Swallow in Full Plumage

James Keolker - November 13, 2007
San Francisco Opera has described this as “A Season of Glamour,” and that boast was certainly fulfilled with the company's new and exuberant production of Puccini’s La Rondine. It was long overdue, the last having been in the War Memorial Opera House House in 1934, with Lucrezia Bori and Dino Borgioli in the leading roles and S.F.
Feature

Making Small Beautiful

James Keolker - October 2, 2007
San Francisco Classical Voice has often reported on how the Bay Area’s smaller opera companies are continuing to grow and to prosper. There are now at least 22 such companies, according to a recent SFCV survey.

Merolini Make It All Shine

James Keolker - August 21, 2007
The 50th year of the highly merited Merola Opera training program ended with a flourish of young hopefuls at the San Francisco War Memorial Opera House on Saturday evening with a Grand Finale concert, assisted by members of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra.
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Review

Storming the Fortress

James Keolker - July 17, 2007
The current Festival del Sole in the Napa Valley took a stellar leap forward Saturday evening with both the talent it featured and the place in which that talent was showcased.