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Superlative Performances from Vache Baroque at Magdalen College, Oxford – Opera Today
As part of the Music in Oxford series, the award-winning music ensemble Vache Baroque produced an artfully conceived programme built around Oscar Wilde’s De Profundis letter of 1897, written during his incarceration in Reading Gaol
Musical liveliness transcends some obscurities in the Royal Academy’s hospital-based Magic Flute – Opera Today
Jamie Manton's production of The Magic Flute for the Royal Academy of Music takes its cue from Tamino's predicament at the opera’s opening – wounded and in mortal danger. Accordingly, he is found on a
An unconventional, satirical take on Weber’s Der Freischütz for Opera Ballet Vlaanderen at Antwerp – Opera Today
Weber’s Der Freischütz is well-known – and variously admired or deplored – as one of the seminal works of German musical Romanticism. Despite its fame and influence, it isn’t now encountered on stage as often
The Guildhall Symphony Orchestra: a thrilling program of Hillborg, Britten and Strauss. – Opera Today
Guildhall Symphony Orchestra concerts are always something of an event and this one was no exception. Taking in a Swedish modern classic, one of Benjamin Britten’s finest works and a virtuosic ‘symphony’ of monumental and
A Captivating new production of Pelléas et Mélisande at Opéra Bastille – Opera Today
Premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1902 and closely based on Maurice Maeterlinck’s play, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande is renowned for its collision between “its severest realism and the most impalpable dream world”, (Pierre
Double, double toil and trouble: a witches’ cauldron in Royal Opera’s Il Trovatore – Opera Today
There are some people who still believe in witches and the power of superstition. Jumping from an allusion to Shakespeare’s Macbeth in the above title to Hamlet’s declaration to Horatio that there are more things
Stéphane Fuget’s new recording of Lully Alceste from Versailles – Opera Today
Lully’s “tragédie lyrique en prologue et cinq actes" Alceste is set to a libretto by Philippe Quinault, after Euripides (Alcestis). The first performance took place at the Theâtre du Palais-Royal on January 19, 1674; Alceste
Charpentier from La Nuova Musica and Voktett Hannover at Wigmore Hall – Opera Today
Under the direction of Baroque specialist David Bates, La Nuova Musica joined forces with the German a capella ensemble Voktett Hannover to reveal two sides of French composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier. Sacred and secular offerings from
A simple, effective staging of a Thea Musgrave’s politically intricate opera Mary, Queen of Scots – Opera Today
Given the obsession with the Tudors – particularly as TV, stage or literary drama, as well as historical documentary – it makes for a welcome variation on this subject that English National Opera should mount
Of loneliness, dragons and heroics: Wagner’s Siegfried in a staging by Regents Opera – Opera Today
Nobody should ever assume that creative artists constantly engage in mutual back-slapping. Tolstoy’s verdict on Wagner’s Siegfried, the second day of the Ring cycle, was vicious: “A stupid puppet show not even good enough for
A powerful and unsettling Aida at the Royal Opera House – Opera Today
An empty stage enclosing grey walls of a concrete bunker. This is the initial impression we have of Robert Carsen’s Aida, presented at the Royal Opera House in a first revival by Gilles Rico. The cheerless staging does
Life, death and holidays: lieder by Schubert, Loewe and Krenek at Wigmore Hall – Opera Today
Wigmore Hall gave London audiences the opportunity to hear lieder recitals by two leading German-speaking baritones within the space of a weekend. Konstantin Krimmel was joined by pianist Ammiel Bushakevitz for a programme of Schubert
Compelling performances from OperaUpClose: Riders to the Sea & The Last Bit of the Moon – Opera Today
What does one perform with Vaughan Williams’s seldom heard one act tragedy about a mother who has lost her last surviving son somewhere off the west coast of Ireland? Drawn from J.M. Synge’s doom-laden play