Peter Fox Smith
CommentatorPeter was part of VPR from 1977, hosting Saturday Afternoon at the Opera and then A Passion For Opera, until VPR's 40th anniversary in 2017.
Opera had always been one of Peter's passions. As a young boy visiting his paternal grandparents, he was treated to impromptu concerts by touring stars of the Metropolitan Opera performing with his grandmother. He is author of A Passion For Opera: Learning To Love It: The Greatest Masters, Their Greatest Music, released in 2004 by Trafalgar Square Publishing.
As a student at Harvard, Peter's doctoral thesis was on Wagner. An appointment at Dartmouth College allowed him to pursue his three passions: athletics, academics and the arts. He coached Dartmouth's women's cross country running team, taught opera courses to freshmen through master candidates and produced an annual arts concert for many years.
Peter passed away on October 5, 2020, and by his longtime audio engineer Sam Sanders.
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We hear selections from three operas that had their premieres during the first week of February: Charpentier's Louise, Rossini's Semiramide, and Verdi's鈥� -
We honor Mozart's January 27th Birthday with a program of excerpts from some of his early operas - plus a remembrance of American coloratura soprano鈥� -
We concentrate on Act III of Tosca, and we consider the kinship of Puccini's three major soprano roles, Mim矛, Tosca, and Butterfly.Listen Saturday,鈥�
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We hear excerpts from one of the most popular of all operas, Puccini's Tosca, with such singers as Maria Callas, Renata Tebaldi, Tito Gobbi, and Ruggero鈥� -
Excerpts from Handel's opera seria, Ariodante serves as an introduction to Handelian opera. Dame Janet Baker sings the title role.Listen Saturday, January鈥� -
We hear excerpts from Donizetti's comic masterpiece Don Pasquale, with Fernando Corena in the title role.Listen Saturday, December 31 at 12 noon. -
We present music appropriate to Christmas, including Wagner's Siegfried-Idyll and excerpts from Amahl and the Night Visitors, H盲nsel und Gretel, and鈥� -
Cimarosa's Il matrimonio segreto is believed to be the only opera ever encored in its entirety on its first performance. We hear excerpts from two fine鈥� -
Puccini joined the 20th century musically with La fanciulla del West in 1910. We present an introduction to this opera with excerpts performed by such鈥� -
We present a recital by soprano Anna Netrebko and tenor Marcelo 脕lvarez, who star in Saturday's Metropolitan Opera broadcast of Puccini's Manon鈥�
