Le Nozze di Figaro, Arizona Opera – April, 2013
“Then there was the music, performed by the Arizona Opera Orchestra with inspired enthusiasm and renewed sense of purpose under Revzen’s baton. Revzen conducted while playing the harpsichord, which created a metallic, tingly sound between scenes that in many ways evolved into an off-stage character.”
Arizona Daily Star (Cathalena Burch)
Il Trovatore, Arizona Opera – March, 2013
“Joel Revzen was the conductor who held everything together for this excellent performance. With a brisk, light approach, he gave a propulsive account of the score that pushed forward with relentless power.”
Opera Today (Maria Nockin)
Die Entfürung aus dem Serail, Arizona Opera – April, 2011
“Arizona Opera’s Die Entfurung aus dem Serail…shone with the gorgeous sound emanating from the pit under Joel Revzen’s expert direction…”
Opera Magazine (UK)
Otello, Arizona Opera – March 2011
“Otello was the company’s most nearly-perfect production within memory. Revzen elicited almost magical sounds from his orchestra, and kept the action at a plausible pace.”
Opera Magazine (UK)
La Traviata, Charlotte, NC – February 2011
“…the Charlotte Symphony, conducted by Joel Revzen, played with force enough to underline the singers’ intensity, delicacy enough to complement their poetry.”
The Charlotte Observer, Steve Brown
La Traviata, Charlotte, NC – February 2011
“Joel Revzen…led a superbly balanced and judged performance. The strings of the Charlotte Symphony glowed and shimmered in Verdi’s heart-rending melodies. The woodwinds were stongly characterized, and the trumpets played with extraordinary refinement and subtlety.”
Charlotte VNC: Online Arts Journal
Orfeo, Arizona Opera – April 2012
“We got to see a wonderfully tight, exciting performance on stage and in the pit under the baton of Joel Revzen.”
Arizona Daily Star (Cathalena Burch)
Cavalleria Rusticana/I Pagliacci, Arizona Opera – October 2012
“The orchestra under the baton of Joel Revzen played cleanly and expressively”
Arizona Republic (Richard Nilsen)
Faust, Arizona Opera – November, 2012
“Faust superb in all artistic aspects”
Arizona Republic (Richard Nilsen)
Don Giovanni, Opera New Jersey – July 2010
“Joel Revzen lead the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra in a blistering performance. Opera New Jersey had the audience on its feet for a roaring and richly deserved standing ovation…
Start Ledger
The Consul, Washington Opera
“Joel Revzen conducted with clarity, propulsion, and abundant feeling.”
~ Opera News, April 2001 (Tim Smith)
The Consul, Washington Opera
“The orchestra was led by Joel Revzen, who balanced pit and stage subtly, keeping textures in the small orchestra clear…when called on to make swells of sound, conductor, orchestra and soloists obliged, and there were, especially in the vocal ensembles, moment of great beauty”.
~ Washington Post, Philip Kennicot
Parsifal, Mannheim National
Der Neue Merker,
“I had never heard the conductor’s name before. But during the prelude to the first act, it became clear to me…during the course of the evening Joel Revzen made no attempt to set an arbitrary tempo or willfully distinguish himself. Revzen proved himself to be a connoisseur of the material, by his knowledge and feeling for the right balance of sound volume, quiet, motion, accompaniment, and individual development… Seldom have I ever heard the opening of Act II played so naturally and flowing –
~Vienna Austria, April 1, 1994
Rigoletto, Giuseppe Verdi, Norwegian Opera Company
“Among the positive aspects of the production one should also underline the masterful direction of Joel Revzen. He gives a purely ‘Verdian’ interpretation, with dramatic strength and refined sensitivity… The perfect alliance of conductor and soprano gave an new flavour to the famous aria ‘caro nome’, which did not sound like the usual ‘technical nightingale’, but gained in lyricism , harmony and sincerity.”
~ Arbeiderbladet, Oslo Norway, April 21, 1997
Berkshire Opera – The Rake’s Progress
“The musical standard was first-class. Like every other opera company in the world, Berkshire Opera could use a little (or a lot) more money. But the things you cannot put a price on seem to be securely in place – imagination, taste, standards and a sense of mission – and that’s not an observation not anybody could make about every other opera company in the world.”
~ The Boston Globe, August 21, 1996
Rigoletto, Berkshire Opera Company
“Revzen conducted with fire, sympathy, style, and insight.”
~ Richard Dyer, Boston Globe
Rigoletto, Berkshire Opera Company
“Joel Revzen, who has done some wonderful work with this company in his years as its artistic director, conducts.”
~ NY Times
Summer, Stephen Paulus
Berkshire Opera (World Premiere)
“Mr Revzen drew shapely playing from the Camerata New York Orchestra”
~ Anthony Tommasini, New York Times
“Joel Revzen conducted the excellent Camerata New York Orchestra with great clarity and feeling”.
~ Heidi Waleson, Wall Street Journal (opera summer)
Carmen, Berkshire Opera Company
“Conductor Joel Revzen was after something colorful, swift, proportionate…one of the many things a great performance of Carme needs to be about.”
~ Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe
The Turn of the Screw. Britten
Berkshire Opera Company
“Mr. Revzen led a bracing, dramatically astute performance”.
~ Allan Kozinn, The New York Times
Online Articles
Arizona Opera
4/17/11 – Arizona Opera, Mozart “Abduction from the Seraglio”
3/16 /11– Arizona Opera, Verdi “Otello”, March 16, 2011
2/06/11 – Opera Carolina, Verdi “La Traviata”, Steven Brown, Charlotte Observer
2/05/11 – Opera Carolina, Verdi “La Traviata”
2/05/11 – Opera Carolina, Verdi, “La Traviata”, Classical Voice of North Carolina (CVNC)
5/3/10 – “Barber” ends Arizona Opera season with laughs
4/29/10 – KUAT Arizona Illustrated – The Barber of Seville
4/27/10 – Opera Today Review’s “The Barber of Seville”
4/26/10 – KBAQ Reviews 2009-2010 Arizona Opera Season
3/25/10 – ‘Barber of Seville’ has boffo Figaro
2/14/10 – It’s Standing Room Only at Arizona Opera’s ‘La Boheme’
2/6/10 – ‘La Boheme’ breaks 11-year streak for Arizona Opera
2/1/10 – Soprano Leads Arizona Opera ‘Boheme’
01/1/10 – Two Latinos make Arizona Opera debut in world-renowned classic
7/13/10 – Opera New Jersey season opens with witty ‘Don Giovanni’
7/13/10 – A ‘Don Giovanni’ with theatrical presence
7/15/10 – ‘Don Giovanni’ Audiences will leave Opera New Jersey’s current production in a state of exhilaration
7/15/10 – In Princeton, an impressive ‘Don Giovanni’
Carmen
(Arizona Opera)
“…conductor Joel Revzen, the company’s Artistic and General Manager, brought Bizet’s composition to lusty life, tightly directing so that the music swayed and danced and cried and loved.”
Kathleen Allen, Arizona Daily Star (Tucson), October 13, 2005
“Conductor Joel Revzen was after something colorful, swift, proportionate…one of the many things a great performance of Carmen needs to be about.”
Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe
La Cenerentola
(Florida Grand Opera)
“Happily, the company’s current production of Rossini’s La Cenerentola serves up a witty, delightful staging of the Cinderella story, with an excellent cast, a stylish conductor, and a charming production that delivers coloratura vocalism and comedy in winning fashion.”
“Major kudos to conductor Joel Revzen and director A. Scott Parry who, like most of the cast, are making their FGO debuts. Revzen, a veteran Met hand and artistic director of Arizona Opera, showed himself an inspired and stylish Rossinian, pacing the two long acts masterfully with cleanly pointed rhythms and neat articulation throughout from the FGO orchestra.”
Lawrence A. Johnson, Miami Herald, January 26, 2009
SouthFloridaClassicalReview.com, January 26, 2009
South Florida Sun-Sentinel, January 30, 2009
The Consul
(Washington National Opera)
“The orchestra was led by Joel Revzen, who balanced pit and stage subtly, keeping textures in the small orchestra clear….when called on to make swells of sound, conductor, orchestra and soloists obliged, and there were, especially in the vocal ensembles, moments of great beauty.”
Philip Kennicott, Washington Post, January 1, 2001
Don Giovanni
“Joel Revzen conducted with clarity, propulsion and abundant feeling.”
Tim Smith, Opera News, April 2001
(Berkshire Opera Company)
“Artistic Director Joel Revzen’s conducting was intelligently paced and dramatic, and the playing of the orchestra, as always since his arrival, was very classy; he encouraged a little stylish ornamentation of the vocal lines.”
Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe, August 23, 2000
“In the hands of Berkshire Opera’s Music Director, Joel Revzen, Don Giovanni takes the audience into a compelling adventure…and elevates Berkshire Opera into the ranks of top regional opera companies in the United States.”
Herbert Wolff, WAMC Radio (Albany, NY), August 29, 2000
Der Fliegende Holländer
(Arizona Opera)
“Because of the music, the impressive sets, a cast with mostly strong vocal qualities and a knowledgeable conductor who kept things lively but under control, the opera was a remarkable success for an audience that, for the most part, had its first Wagnerian experience.”
“Arizona Opera’s orchestra fulfilled the musical expectations one must have in a Wagnerian production, thanks to the conductor. Arizona Opera has not performed a Wagner opera since the late Glynn Ross, former General Director of Arizona Opera brought Wagner’s Ring cycle to the state in 1996 and 1998. It’s therefore to Revzen’s credit that we have been presented with a new and quite memorable Wagner event.”
Dimitri Drobatschewsky, The Arizona Republic (Phoenix), March 24, 2006
Macbeth
(Arizona Opera)
“The performance also benefited immensely from conductor Joel Revzen’s deep understanding not only of the musical score, but of the theatrical interdependence of this complex masterwork.”
Dimitri Drobatschewsky, The Arizona Republic (Phoenix), October 12, 2006
The Mikado
(Arizona Opera)
“Joel Revzen’s orchestra treated the score like the ingenious masterpiece it is; he had assembled a vocally gifted, comedically game cast that would have done credit to any company.”
“The evenings warm standing ovations were merited.”
David Shengold, Opera News, February 2009
Le nozze di Figaro
(Arizona Opera)
“And the orchestra, under conductor Joel Revzen, is as smooth and beautiful as you could want. Mozart’s wind writing is excellently played.”
Richard Nilsen, The Arizona Republic (Phoenix), November 16, 2006
Parsifal
(Nationaltheater, Mannheim GERMANY)
“I had never heard the conductor’s name before. But during the prelude to the first act, it became clear to me – ‘Better than Bayreuth under Levine’ is the general consensus of the orchestra’s performance – during the course of the evening Joel Revzen made no attempt to set an arbitrary tempo or willfully distinguish himself. Revzen proved himself to be a connoisseur of the material, by his knowledge and feeling for the right balance of sound volume, quiet, motion, accompaniment, and individual development. Seldom have I ever heard the opening of Act II played so naturally and flowing.”
A.U., Der neue Merker, April 1, 1994
The Rake’s Progress
(Berkshire Opera Company)
“Berkshire Opera’s Artistic Director shed an unusual light on Stravinsky’s neoclassical music. A certain scruffiness is part of its nature, but it shouldn’t sound as bitty and bar-lined, as mechanical, as it often does. Revzen seized on every element of lyricism, sought the long line, encouraged his singers to bring musical shape as well as sharp diction to their phrases, without ever succumbing to slackness…”
“The musical standard was first-class. Like every other opera company in the world, Berkshire Opera could use a little (or a lot) more money. But the things you cannot put a price on seem to be securely in place – imagination, taste, standards and a sense of mission – and that’s not an observation not anybody could make about every other opera company in the world.”
Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe, August 21, 1996
“Conductor Joel Revzen deserves a medal for providing the artistic glue to hold all of this together. His clear leadership, coupled with superior musical gifts, which he uses to everyone’s benefit, brings home the gold.”
Peter Haley, Times Union (Springfield, MA)
The Rape of Lucretia
(Berkshire Opera Company)
“Joel Revzen, the Company’s new Artistic Director, was alert to the knotty, lyrical score’s protection of the text, keeping the orchestra down while pointing up its colorful solos.”
Leslie Kandell, Opera News
Rigoletto
(Berkshire Opera Company)
“The orchestra was full of first-rate players, and Revzen conducted with fire, sympathy, style, and insight.”
Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe, June 28, 2004
“Joel Revzen, who has done some wonderful work with this company in his years as its Artistic Director, conducts.”
Allan Kozinn, The New York Times, June 25, 2004
(Den Norske Opera)
“Among the positive aspects of the production one should also underline the masterful musical direction of Joel Revzen. He gives a purely ‘Verdian’ interpretation, with dramatic strength and refined sensitivity…”
“The perfect alliance of conductor and soprano gave a new flavour to the famous aria ‘Caro nome’, which did not sound like the usual music of a ‘mechanical nightingale’, but instead gained in lyricism, harmony and sincerity.”
A.U., Arbeiderbladet (Oslo), April 21, 1997
Summer
(Berkshire Opera Company – World Premiere)
“Mr. Revzen drew shapely playing from the Camerata New York Orchestra.”
Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times, September 2, 1999
“Leading the Camerata New York Orchestra, Artistic Director Joel Revzen illuminated every corner of Paulus’ expressive scoring for modest, cannily deployed forces. Everyone showed abundant commitment to the new work and made its lyricism soar.”
John W. Freeman, Opera News, December 1999
“Joel Revzen conducted the excellent Camerata New York Orchestra with great clarity and feeling.”
Heidi Waleson, The Wall Street Journal, September 13, 1999
“…The excellent Camerata New York Orchestra and its committed conductor, Berkshire Opera’s Artistic Director Joel Revzen, made a genuine emotional investment in the work; the orchestra shimmered in a true sound of Summer.”
Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe, August 30, 1999
Susannah
(Arizona Opera)
“Under a taut reading by conductor Joel Revzen, the music swells and quivers as Susannah seeks redemption; it’s cinematic and playful when the townsfolk gather to square dance; and it’s heart-wrenching with soaring strings and a few well-placed percussive and brass exclamations as Susannah throws in the towel and gives into Blitch and her undeserved reputation.
The music has subtle nods to bluegrass and broad strokes of mountain roots that make it accessible to casual audiences, and Revzen and his ensemble brought out every twangy nuance of its Southern accent.”
Cathalena E. Burch, Arizona Daily Star (Tucson), April 30, 2007
La Traviata
(Arizona Opera)
“Arizona Opera presented a moving Traviata at Symphony Hall on April 19, well conducted by intendant Joel Revzen”
“From the opening bars of the Prelude, Revzen’s orchestra mustered reassuringly fine ensemble, and his pacing was judicious.”
David Shengold, Opera News, June 2008
“If there’s a spot that opera is supposed to hit, Arizona Opera’s La Traviata hit it. Bull’s eye.”
“The orchestra, under conductor Joel Revzen, played beautifully and provided near-perfect pacing.”
Richard Nilsen, The Arizona Republic (Phoenix), April 18, 2008
The Turn of the Screw
(Berkshire Opera Company – 2002)
“The Turn of the Screw proved a wise choice for inaugurating the house. The opera’s extraordinary scoring for a chamber orchestra of 13 accommodated the current pit configuration, and under Joel Revzen’s propulsive yet attentive leadership, the ensemble fared very well.”
“Along with conductor Revzen, the entire production team deserves plaudits.”
David Shengold, Andante.com, August 9, 2002
(Berkshire Opera Company – 1994)
“Mr. Revzen led a bracing, dramatically astute performance…”
Allan Kozinn, The New York Times, August 29, 1994
Die Zauberflöte
(Arizona Opera)
“Conductor Joel Revzen took Mozart at his literal word, adopting a tempo that enhanced the comedy but never lost sight of the fact that the music was some of Mozart’s finest ever. The orchestra’s performance of the Overture was sublime and fluid, with such detail and crispness you wished they would have performed it again as an encore.”
Cathalena E. Burch, Arizona Daily Star (Tucson), March 2, 2008
“The orchestra under conductor Joel Revzen keeps the pace moving for this three-hour delight, which felt no longer than an hour or so; it moved so fleetly.”
Richard Nilsen, The Arizona Republic (Phoenix), March 9, 2008
Merola Grand Finale Concert
(San Francisco Opera)
“Conductor Joel Revzen and the orchestra provided able and often luscious support throughout.”
Steven Winn, San Francisco Chronicle, August 18, 2008
“Joel Revzen conducted the Opera Orchestra (in its summer manifestation) very well, serving the music, and helping to showcase the voices.”
Janos Gereben, San Francisco Classical Voice, August 19, 2008
“Joel Revzen conducted the San Francisco Opera Orchestra to good effect…”
Charlise Tiee, The Opera Tattler (San Francisco), August 17, 2008