"I Pagliacci” or “The Clowns,” set in a traveling circus, is one of the most popular of opera tragedies, full of irresistible music. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s 1892 dramatic tale — he wrote the libretto ...

When it comes to challenging operatic roles for tenors, the clown troupe leader Canio in Leoncavallo Ruggero’s beloved 1892 “Pagliacci” is right up there. It requires power-singing, vocal range and ...

Paul Groves was a child when he first heard that classic, mournful tenor aria usually sung by a clown on opera stages. The song — specifically one of its passages — is usually recognized even by those ...

Tragedy in opera can deliver an emotional sucker punch like no other medium. Usually, the music is to blame. But when the main characters also work in a clown troupe and must continue to entertain ...

At least once every season, Petaluma's Cinnabar Theater stages a classic opera. This year, the company decided to send in the clown -- not just any clown, but the crown prince of clowns. Ruggero ...

This very special double-bill begins with Pagliacci (The Clowns), one of opera's most powerful stories of overwhelming jealously and its lethal passion, which features the heartbreaking aria "Vesti la ...

Any production of Leoncavallo’s evergreen verismo masterwork I Pagliacci (The Clowns) — including the San Diego Opera’s (Oct. 31 – Nov. 2) — must grapple with the tension at the opera’s heart: its ...

RUNTIME: About two hours, including one intermission and on-stage extra performances (see below). THUMBNAIL SKETCH: In the long history of the performing arts, traveling troupes would go from town to ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Pietro Mascagni’s “Cavalleria rusticana” might have been a one-hit wonder for its composer but it was Satchmo’s favorite opera. In ...