Shakespeare’s comedies are about as funny as lobotomy – but this adaptation is a triumph
Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is notoriously tricky to get right, which makes this Garsington production an unexpected delight
Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is notoriously tricky to get right, which makes this Garsington production an unexpected delight
Donizetti meets Gilbert and Sullivan in a performance that is not shy about finding the humour in the composer’s work
David Bates’s conducting leaves little flexibility and freedom for the voices to create their own drama out of Busenello’s vivid text
Judith Weir’s whimsical woodland psychodrama gets a film noir treatment – with a score so taut it threatens to burst
This gaudy 1896 drama is an odd choice for the swansong of Covent Garden’s great music director, but he just about pulls it off
Rameau’s opera has a deeply unpleasant plot, but Garsington’s exuberantly vulgar, expertly sung staging makes it fly
One of Britain’s finest conductors talks about the crisis at ENO and saying goodbye to the Hallé Orchestra after nearly quarter of a century
The founder of Opera Holland Park on arrogance in the industry, getting children into classical music and high-level philistinism
This biting new production wrenches the piece into the present, displaying a struggle for women’s autonomy in the face of male oppression
His Majesty was the special guest at a gala celebrating Sir Antonio Pappano, who conducted the coronation
This opera’s constant energy and drive was captured to the full by the small, taut forces of the Irish Baroque Orchestra
Thanks to devastating funding cuts from both the English and Welsh art councils, the future of this brilliant company is now at stake
This performance of the lesser-known original version was a testament to music director Mark Elder’s magnificent 24-year period at the Halle
The Festival’s innovative production – led by three world-class singers – is underpinned by an unchanging commitment to musical excellence
Duke Ellington heard her as Lady Macbeth and telephoned to introduce himself. ‘Yeah, and I’m the president of the United States,’ she said
Aigul Akhmetshina is riveting in the title role, but Antonello Manacorda seems ill-at-ease with the fantastic flexibility of Bizet’s score
‘I have a strongly ambivalent attitude towards authority… my basic tendency is to sabotage it, and satire is my favourite literary genre’
This lavish staging – destined for Covent Garden – may be as good as this grand but challenging opera is ever going to get
From Handel on a boat to an epic finale for the LPO Ring cycle, the season’s offerings range from the intimate to the cosmic
Boldly sung in the original Hungarian, this showed ingenuity in the face of adversity, but maybe semi-staging the work was a flawed approach