Reviews
Samantha Hankey’s Composer is the standout in the Wiener Staatsoper’s episodically sublime Ariadne auf Naxos revival.
Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s Grammy-winning Intelligence makes a largely successful East Coast debut at Virginia Opera.
The Ralph Fiennes production of Eugene Onegin at the Paris Opera is just…fine.
The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra under conductor Stéphane Denève plays up the schtick in a concert performance of The Magic Flute – and obscures Mozart’s magic in the process.
Joyce DiDonato makes the most of Kevin Puts‘s trite new Emily Dickinson monodrama.
That Trump opera at the Staatsoper Hamburg is lazy activism at its finest, we fear.
An excellent Věc Makropulos at Opéra de Lille makes the case for the vitality and necessity of France’s regional companies.
San Diego Opera presents a strongly directed and cast revival of Il barbiere di Siviglia.
Caitlin Vincent‘s new book Opera Wars paints a persuasive picture of the problems facing opera today, though her solutions leave something to be desired.
In Modena, Teodor Currentzis‘s Ring ohne Worte foregoes words but not gimmickry.
Marina Rebeka comes tantalizingly close to triumph in Cherubini’s Médée at Théâtre des Champs Elysées.
Under the baton of Nicholas McGegan, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale proves they have a magic touch in a program of Rameau and Handel.
Austin Opera’s moving production of Fiddler on the Roof grounds itself in lived tradition, to great effect.
Davóne Tines leads a thought-provoking program in San Francisco reconsidering patriotism, dissent, and spirituality as the United States faces down its quarter millennium crisis.
La Monnaie’s flamboyantly busy new production of Benvenuto Cellini reads more burlesque than Berlioz.
Christof Loy’s production of Pablo Luna’s gender-bending Orientalist farce Benamor proves to be irresistible.
Die Entführung aus dem Serail boldly goes where no opera has gone before at Pacific Opera Project.
Despite some complications, the Deutsche Oper exhumes buried treasure in Franz Schreker’s Der Schatzgräber.
Iván Fischer‘s Mahler 3 with the Budapest Festival Orchestra at Carnegie Hall is memorable but crude, sometimes exhilarating and often tedious.
A chic production of Violanta at the Deutshce Oper Berlin continues the Korngold craze on the other side of the Atlantic.
Juan Diego Flórez‘s charm and artistic sensibility remain as vibrant as ever, as seen at a recent Carnegie Hall recital.
In an all-Mozart program with the San Francisco Symphony, Golda Schultz shows that her soubrette days are behind her.
The dazzling and deeply moving Complications in Sue bodes well for Anthony Roth Costanzo‘s stewardship of Opera Philadelphia.
Das Wunder der Heliane fuses sex with the sacred at a simmering performance at the Opéra National du Rhin.
Tell us: What’s your favorite Verdi performance?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
