State of siege
An amateurish production of Le siège de Corinthe, combined with heavy-handed conducting, at Pesaro weakens the defenses of one of Rossini‘s most topical operas.
Nigel Wilkinson
Nigel has attended opera regularly, in Paris and elsewhere, for over 40 years. His focus is more on live, staged opera, warts and all, than recordings. His reports, which started as an aide-mémoire but were soon shared with friends and eventually became a blog, aim to encapsulate the unique experience, warts and all, of an ordinary, paying opera-goer. His other interests include travel, food and friendships, and he collects art by (mostly) young artists from around the world. UK-born and a graduate of Trinity College Cambridge, he has lived and worked in Iran and Turkey, but settled in Paris and, Brexit oblige, is now French.
His mouth is always scandalous
A Pasolini-inspired Tosca at La Monnaie does not quite find the pleasure in the pain.
Et O ces voix d’enfants
Brundibár at the Opéra Comique combines whimsy with historicity to sobering effect.
Bembo eruption
Supported by an ingenious production and strong performances, Antonia Bembo’s Ercole Amante makes a successful Paris Opera debut.
Denise Duval should have made it to the Met
I decided I’d take ‘never made it to the Met’ as an excuse to submit a post about why French soprano Denise Duval (1921-2015) is special to me.
Gorgon wild
Iain Bell and Lydia Steier‘s Medusa stuns in Brussels.
No need to grin and bear it
An exciting cast digs their claws into a heady production of La Calisto at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
Come and Gandhi
Led by a mesmerizing Anthony Roth Costanzo, Satyagraha at the Paris Opera dispenses with historical particularities for something for more elusive.
Suffering a sea-change
Calixto Bieito‘s production of Idomeneo at La Monnaie is anchored by a committed cast, but gets swept up in pseudo-psychoanalytic imagery — and foot fetishism.
By the (little red) book
Kent Nagano gives a boost to the Opéra national de Paris‘s revival of Nixon in China.
The company of wolves
Matthias Pintscher’s Nuit sans aube at the Opéra Comique conjures up plenty of atmosphere — but not much else.
Onegin, off again
The Ralph Fiennes production of Eugene Onegin at the Paris Opera is just…fine.
Diva down
An excellent Věc Makropulos at Opéra de Lille makes the case for the vitality and necessity of France’s regional companies.
Mother is mothering
Marina Rebeka comes tantalizingly close to triumph in Cherubini’s Médée at Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
Life of the Mardi
La Monnaie’s flamboyantly busy new production of Benvenuto Cellini reads more burlesque than Berlioz.
I want you to enter the holy of holies
Das Wunder der Heliane fuses sex with the sacred at a simmering performance at the Opéra National du Rhin.
Nature boy
With Siegfried, the directorial vision of the Paris Opera‘s Ring cycle finally takes root.
The best thing I saw in 2025 was Robinson Crusoé
“When there’s so much to get right, unsurprisingly a lot can and, as we all know, does go wrong.”
Car Park Casta Diva
Fine music-making meets a clunker of a production in La Monnaie‘s revival of Norma
Life in the Faust lane
Théâtre de l’Athénée Louis-Jouvet mounts a raucous production of Hervé’s Le petit Faust.
All the fine young cannibals
Offenbach‘s Robinson Crusoé is salvaged from obscurity.
Get in the zone
Tamara Wilson and Stanislas de Barbeyrac are the standouts in Calixto Bieito’s underwhelming Die Walküre in Paris
Damned to hell
Only the singers, led by Benjamin Bernheim, can salvage a dismal La Damnation de Faust at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
Frieze frame
Shirin Neshat‘s Aïda in Paris is a typical instance of what happens when an artist is brought in to direct an opera.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
