Among her most recent Boston performances were the controversial Bach cantatas staged by Peter Sellars, with Hunt Lieberson as a hospital patient hooked to IVs and yearning for death. The Nonesuch CD, conducted by Craig Smith with oboist Peggy Pearson and the Emmanuel Orchestra, became something of a bestseller. Last November, at the BSO, she sang Neruda Songs, gorgeous, soulful settings of five Neruda love poems composed for her by husband, Peter Lieberson, a BSO co-commission that became a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in music. Her last Boston appearance was as the lamenting Wood Dove in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder, which she sang so profoundly at Symphony Hall last February. Hearing her, at the height of her power and artistry, who could believe she was ill?
Lately, her cancellations made almost as much news as her performances. It’s understandable. What could be more disappointing than missing someone you wanted to hear so badly? I could barely wait to see her in the title role of Gluck’s Orfeo, which Mark Morris was scheduled to direct her in at the Met. Like the beloved British contralto of half a century ago, Kathleen Ferrier, whose last role was Orfeo, Hunt Lieberson died much too young, her star still rising. We all hoped she would go on forever.
Related:
Year in Classical: Celebrate!, Boston feasts, Epic undertaking, More 
- Year in Classical: Celebrate!
In Handel's Hercules, the demented Dejanira's loss is still so painful, I was afraid to listen; now I don't want to hear anything else.
- Boston feasts
The Boston Symphony Orchestra, Celebrity Series, Emmanuel Music, Boston Early Music Festival, and more.
- Epic undertaking
The act four sequence of quintet, septet, and love duet is non-stop musical orgasm.
- Winter harvest
"I don’t want to be here,” soprano Susan Larson lamented in her moving eulogy to her old friend and colleague Lorraine Hunt Lieberson.
- Orpheus in the afterworld
Tomsic’s last Boston recital was four years ago. We can’t afford to be without her this long.
- Craig Smith (1947–2007)
For more than 30 years, Emmanuel Music has been central to the cultural life of Boston.
- All over again
The Boston Symphony Orchestra program for last week’s four concerts was a familiar one.
- Damned good
James Levine returned from his winter break with one of the most thrilling BSO concerts of his tenure: Berlioz’s “dramatic legend,” La damnation de Faust.
- Granduer and intimacy
One of the most delightful moments in Mozart comes at the very end of his Symphony No. 39 in E-flat, the first of his last trio of great symphonies.
- Here comes the bride
It's been a long time since Bostonians had the chance to see the most popular Czech opera, Bedrich Smetana's The Bartered Bride , but Opera Boston followed its electrifying run of Shostakovich's The Nose with this tuneful folk opera and gave it a sweet and very likable production.
- Mad love
The destructive power of jealousy makes a good subject for opera.
- Less
Topics:
Music Features
, Entertainment, Music, Wood Dove, More
, Entertainment, Music, Wood Dove, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Johannes Brahms, Peggy Pearson, Classical Music, Opera, Hector Berlioz, John Harbison, Less
