Rufus Wainwright: Between Two Worlds

At the age of 13, Rufus Wainwright—best known as a Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter—heard opera for the first time. This fateful meeting turned into a life-long love which inspired him to compose his own operas: Prima Donna and, most recently, Hadrian. Listen as Artistic Director Evans Mirageas asks him about his musical inspirations, recent compositions, and life as an artist in two seemingly different musical worlds.

Show Notes

• Wainwright’s opera Hadrian is being premiered by the Canadian Opera Company and was workshopped by Opera Fusion: New Works

• Glenn Gould

• Luciano Pavarotti

• Beniamino Gigli vs. Vera Lynn

• Piano composers: Chopin, Satie, Beethoven

• Herbert von Karajan – conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic

• Quebec sovereignty movement

• “Liberty Cabbage” is a song composed by Wainwright when he was 16, and he continues to perform it

• Georg Solti conducting Salome with Birgit Nilsson

• Verdi’s Don Carlo with Placido Domingo and Shirley Verret

• The film Diva

• Prima Donna was Wainwright’s first opera

• Maurice Ravel’s ballet piece Bolero

• Maria Callas

• Memoirs of Hadrian, the novel that inspired Wainwright’s opera Hadrian

• Manchester Festival