Lyric Opera’s “Sunday in the Park with Lyric,” with Christopher Humbert Jr. and company/Photo: Kyle Flubacker
Although it was nice to see Lyric Opera’s free pre-season preview concert in Millennium Park return to the fall rather than take place in the summer as it has in recent years, it was unfortunate that it competed for the same auditory space as Taste of Chicago—now a September event—next door in Grant Park.
The summer Grant Park Music Festival learned long ago to retreat indoors to Harris Theater when louder genres perform simultaneously at outdoor festivals.
The rock and pop acts performing at Sunday night’s Taste finale created a sometimes amusing—though more often frustrating—Ivesian collision of thunderous thumps and relentless rumbles, which, when operatic dynamics dipped, were as loud as anything that could be heard coming from the amplified stage of the Pritzker Pavilion.
This was new Lyric general director, president and CEO John Mangum’s first outing as host of Sunday in the Park with Lyric, which signaled a change of direction. Instead of selections from each opera of the 2025-26 season, only half were represented, while non-seasonal operatic fare, standards and dance from the Joffrey Ballet were included.
Cherubini’s “Medea” opens the Lyric season on October 11 and its overture was given a perfunctory and largely drowned-out performance by Lyric music director Enrique Mazzola. He had much better luck leading a contemplative traversal of the Intermezzo from Mascagni’s “Cavalleria rusticana,” which Mazzola will conduct as part of a double bill that also includes Leoncavallo’s “Pagliacci” and opens November 1.
Silvio and Nedda’s “Nedda! Silvio! A quest’ora” duet from “Pagliacci” was rendered by Ryan Center members Sankara Harouna and Emily Richter.
Mozart’s “Cosí fan tutte,” which will open February 1, 2026, was represented by the Act I sextet “Alla bella Despinetta” sung by Ryan Center members and spiritedly conducted by Mazzola.
Ryan Opera Center tenor Daniel Luis Espinal delivered the most memorable performance of the night with his traversal of “Addio, fiorito asil” from Act III of Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly”—which opens March 14, 2026—while the opera’s signature aria “Un bel dì” was sung by Ryan soprano Adia Evans. Both were conducted by Chi-Yuan Lin.
Unrepresented on the program were Billy Corgan’s “A Night of Mellon Collie and Infinite Sadness,” which opens November 21, Richard Strauss’ “Salome” which opens January 25, 2026, Gabriela Lena Frank’s “El último sueño de Frida y Diego” which opens March 21, 2026 and avery r. young’s “safronia” which opens April 17, 2026, though a brief video of young talking about the work was shown.
Instead, the “Habanera” section from the “Carmen” ballet that uses music from the Bizet opera without voices, which will open the Joffrey season on September 18, opened the evening. As if to demonstrate why singing is essential to “Carmen,” the evening closed out with excerpts from the opera, complete with voices.
Lyric Opera has announced its 2025-26 season. For more information, visit lyricopera.org.
