ARIA SERIOUS?

A bit of business: San Diego Opera's Administrative office will be closed starting Thursday, December 23rd at 2 PM and will not reopen until 8:30 AM on Monday, December 27 th . We will also be closed December 31 and will reopen at 8:30 AM on Monday, January 3, 2011. As always, our website http://www.sdopera.com/ is on for you 24/7. The Aria Serious crew will be gone beginning tomorrow and will return January 3, 2011. We need a final hurrah up in the mountains before the season starts in force. Happy holidays and a safe and wonderful New Year. Stay thirsty my friends!

A wonderful heartwarming story about our dear friend, the singer Zheng Cao , who is fighting stage 4 lung cancer, winning, and fell in love along the way...

Thanks for the tunes!

In celebration of her Company debut with us next month, soprano Lise Lindstrom sat down with Opera News to talk about how she became the world's leading ice-princess. You can access the article online here , but we prefer the print version that has a big ' ol San Diego Opera mention in the headline (page 16).

Over the weekend: - A look at how NYCO turned their Company around in a time of economic upheaval. Their mission? Be daring. - Opera is big in China suddenly. A look at the art form's explosion in popularity . - Opera (and classical music) must make a splash to be heard? Does opera need a re-branding to make it "cool?" And here we thought we needed to make good music.

Friday, and thus time to ask: what are you listening to this weekend? To be honest this weekend kind of snuck up on us - and we haven't given our listening plans much thought. We have Ferruccio Furlanetto's new album of Russian lieder unopened on our desk so we'll probably go with that. But we're open to suggestions. So, if there are any "best of 2010 recordings" out there that we should know about, share them in the comment section below. And please, make it a good one!

Sure, he only composed one opera, but man, what an opera it is. Happy birthday Beethoven. May you be imortalized in a bust on Schroeder's piano.

A look at what it takes to make it as a singer here in San Diego in the wonderful Voice of San Diego Arts Blog. Many of you are singers, what is your story?

We really like to picture this guy a Boba Fett , but we know it's not true. Still, a former bounty hunter is making his Met debut later this month . And we imagine some days, the job descriptions read the same.

Once again, Science! and opera have come together - this time in the announcement that Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History In Time" is getting an operatic adaption to premiere at the Met in the near future. Uh, near future in human terms, not in the scope of the cosmological time. We thought we should clarify here. While the article is in French, we'll be following this one closely . One thing is for sure - opening night is sure to be a big bang.

On this week's podcast Dr. Nic explores the scene in Faust that you've probably never seen .

Over the weekend: - A Q&A with Tony Hall, CEO at Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. - The political opera surrounding opening night at La Scala .

Happy Friday! What are you listening to this weekend? The Aria Serious crew will break with tradition and watch opera instead of listening to opera this weekend by heading out the movies to see the broadcast of Don Carlo . We know. We've often commented that we're not fans of these movies - and we're not - we find them boring because part of our opera experience joy is deciding for what to look at on stage and not relying on the decisions of a camera director. The movies make us feel... claustrophobic - for lack of a better word. But Don Carlo is one of our favorite operas of all time, and we're really looking to seeing Ferruccio "Ace of Basss" Furlanetto sing King Philip - a role he did for us a few seasons back which we maintain is still one of our finest moments on our stage. Besides, there's nothing like sipping coke through a red vine straw at 9 AM in the morning. After that we'll be taking it easy - it should be hot here so we'll catch up o...

Protesters at Milan's La Scala turned violent on the opening night of the opera over the government's proposed budget cuts supporting the arts . Because nothing screams "civil disobedience" like well coiffed opera goers.

Another article about the death of classical music, this one actually filled with some stimulating ideas . But then why would classical music ever think it could complete with pop music which by its very definition is popular music for the masses? No classical music is classical music. It's a niche market. It's exciting. It's very much alive. And it doesn't need to apologize for being what it is. No, it can't compete with bands like U2 or whoever else sells out stadiums these days, but why would it want to?

Ever wonder why Richard Strauss uses the waltz throughout his comic opera Der Rosenkavalier ? Considering that the story takes place in mid-18th century Vienna (a time when the waltz had not quite developed yet) it seems a bit anachronistic. This week's podcast delves into the mystery, and has some good music to boot. You can download the podcast here.

Over the weekend: - Our dear friends Stephen Costello (who made his Company debut with us last season as Romeo in Romeo and Juliet ) and Elizabeth Futral (who was here last season as Violetta in La traviata ) will be taking over The Kennedy Center stage tomorrow evening . It should be good. Any Aria Serious readers going? - We found this bit of news exciting not because it features pop-opera ( popera ?) star Katherine Jenkins, but because there actually is a Dr. Who Christmas Special . - Although purist often scoff at his name, major points for Andrea Bocelli and a story about the healing power of music.

It's Friday! You made it! What are you listening to this weekend? The Aria Serious crew will be listening to The Elixir of Love . We're also catching up with Sufjan Stevens new LP The Age of Adz and The Radio Dept.'s Clinging to a Scheme . After that we'll be out and about - for our San Diego readers there is a lot going on this weekend including the North Park Toyland Parade , December Nights , The South Park Walkabout and the SoNo Park Holiday Fest Chili Cookoff and Beer Garden . We make a mean chili in case you were wondering as we have a liberal hand with "the Merciless Peppers of Quetzalacatenango, grown deep in the jungle primeval by the inmates of a Guatemalan insane asylum..." Share your listening plans down below and please, make it a good one!

If you can get by the odd robotic voices, a sad, funny and true conversation every opera singer has had in the past 24 hours...

It's only four weeks and 2 days late but our newest podcast is now up online. We apologize for the delay - but with vacations, technical difficulties and a few other factors, we've had quite a bit of a delay. But don't worry, we'll be back to our regular schedule soon. We think this one is worth the wait however since it covers one of our personal favorite operas - Turandot - and the grand choruses that run throughout it. You can download the podcast here . We hope you enjoy it. And thanks for waiting!