Opera

The cheering fantasies of Oliver Messel

21 June 2025 9:00 am

Through the grey downbeat years of postwar austerity, we nursed cheering fantasies of a life more lavishly colourful and hedonistic.…

Summer opera festivals have gone Wagner mad

14 June 2025 9:00 am

Another week, another Wagner production at a summer opera festival. This never used to happen. When John Christie launched Glyndebourne…

Thrilling: Garsington’s Queen of Spades reviewed

7 June 2025 9:00 am

Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades is one of those operas that under-promises on paper but over-delivers on stage. It’s hard…

Sincere, serious and beautiful: Glyndebourne’s Parsifal reviewed

31 May 2025 9:00 am

‘Here time becomes space,’ says Gurnemanz in Act One of Parsifal, and true enough, the end of the new Glyndebourne…

The forgotten story of British opera

24 May 2025 9:00 am

British opera was born with Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and then vanished for two-and-a-half centuries, apparently. Between the first performance…

Our half-time scorecard on the Royal Opera’s Ring cycle

17 May 2025 9:00 am

With Die Walküre, the central themes of Barrie Kosky’s Ring cycle for the Royal Opera are starting to emerge, and…

Inspired: Scottish Opera’s Merry Widow reviewed

10 May 2025 9:00 am

The Merry Widow was born in Vienna but she made her fortune in the West End and on Broadway. The…

Poulenc’s Stabat Mater – sacred, fervent and always on the verge of breaking into giggles

26 April 2025 9:00 am

It’s funny what you see at orchestral concerts. See, that is, not just hear. If you weren’t in the hall…

Devastating: WNO’s Peter Grimes reviewed

19 April 2025 9:00 am

Britten’s Peter Grimes turns 80 this June, and it’s still hard to credit it. The whole phenomenon, that is –…

The liberating force of musical modernism

5 April 2025 9:00 am

It’s Arvo Part’s 90th birthday year, which is good news if you like your minimalism glum, low and very, very…

Splendid revival of an unsurpassed production: Royal Opera’s Turandot reviewed

29 March 2025 9:00 am

Puccini’s Turandot is back at the Royal Opera in the 40-year old production by Andrei Serban and… well, guilty pleasure…

Barbara Hannigan needs to stop conducting while singing

22 March 2025 9:00 am

Last week, Barbara Hannigan conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in Haydn, Roussel, Ravel and Britten, though to be honest she…

A dancing, weightless garland of gems: Stephen Hough’s piano concerto reviewed

8 March 2025 9:00 am

Stephen Hough’s new piano concerto is called The World of Yesterday but its second ever performance offered a dispiriting glimpse…

I’m the one who needs a carer now

8 March 2025 9:00 am

My father was discharged from hospital with a plastic bag containing 13 boxes of pills and a vague promise that…

Regents Opera’s Ring is a formidable achievement

22 February 2025 9:00 am

I saw the world end in a Bethnal Green leisure centre. Regents Opera’s Ring cycle, which began in 2022 in…

Opera North’s Flying Dutchman scores a full house in cliché bingo

8 February 2025 9:00 am

The overture to The Flying Dutchman opens at gale force. There’s nothing like it; Mendelssohn and Berlioz both painted orchestral…

The thankless art of the librettist

8 February 2025 9:00 am

Next week, after the première of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new opera Festen, the cast and conductor will take their bow. All…

Learning is a lifelong joy

25 January 2025 9:00 am

‘I love learning about things’ (Amelia, aged nine). Not all children do, but many who have not experienced the pleasure…

Jolie good: Maria reviewed

11 January 2025 9:00 am

Maria is a film by Pablo Larrain, who appears to have a soft spot for the psychodramas of legendary women…

Our verdict on Pappano’s first months at the London Symphony Orchestra

4 January 2025 9:00 am

Sir Antonio Pappano began 2024 as music director of the Royal Opera and ended as chief conductor of the London…

Meet the king of comic opera

14 December 2024 9:00 am

John Savournin has been busy. That comes with the territory for a classical singer – things often get a little…

Vivid, noble and bouyant: AAM’s Messiah reviewed

14 December 2024 9:00 am

More than a thousand musicians took part when Handel’s Messiah was performed in Westminster Abbey in May 1791. It wasn’t…

A keeper: ENO’s new The Elixir of Love reviewed

30 November 2024 9:00 am

There was some light booing on the first night of English National Opera’s The Elixir of Love, but it was…

Fails to ignite: Royal Opera’s Tales of Hoffmann reviewed

16 November 2024 9:00 am

I couldn’t love anyone who didn’t love Offenbach’s The Tales of Hoffmann. Everything – everything – is stacked against this…