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Jonathan Kent claims one of the great difficulties of Mozart-Da Ponte’s 1787 dramma giocoso is ‘the collision of an extraordinary variety of music and mood within it’

David McVicar's production of Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro returns for its sixth revival at the Royal Opera House, the refinement of the production matched, almost at all times, by the performances. 

There is something pleasurably straining, for the big-hall, velvet-accustomed operagoer, about the experience of sitting for three hours on a very tiny bench in a charmingly chiselled, candlelit little theatre that invites contemplation in its own right – beyond the attractions, musical and other, set up within its frame.

Bizet’s name, ever since the early (though by no means instant) success of his last opera and major bestseller Carmen, has become synonymous with the idea of catchy tunes and exotic soundworlds. That’s the composer who is with us most of the time.

The last opera of the Mozart/Da Ponte cycle – the second of the composer’s operas to be performed in this Mozart-dominated season at the Royal Opera House – Così fan tutte pivots on two pairs of young lovers whose affection is put to the test by an old ‘philosopher’, Don Alfonso. Women, the old man argues, are all the same: never constant in their love, never loyal to their men.

English Touring Opera’s Verdi title for their Spring season in this composer’s (and Wagner’s) anniversary year is one of no small ambition. Premièred to only modest success in Venice in 1857, it would take Verdi another 20 or so years to return to Simon Boccanegra to try to fix the old “wobbly table” (as he and his librettist, Boito, later dubbed the 1857 version).

Of the many and varied operatic openings, that of La Traviata is one that I find increasingly demanding on an emotional level. The mournful harmonies and diaphanous scoring for strings that start off the prelude notoriously portray ill-fated Violetta moments before she dies of TB, returning in the final act as her destiny is about to be fulfilled.

After their Mascagni debut last year, with L’amico Fritz (the composer’s first post-Cavalleria opera), Opera Holland Park have set out to uncover more music from the so-called ‘one-hit-wonder’ – still known to most for his smash verismo opera alone.

Fulham Opera’s 2012 season is, once again, one dedicated to Puccini and Wagner. Last year, the company brought to stage Puccini’s Suor Angelica – the long-unpopular middle opera of his Il trittico – and the opening work of Wagner’s Ring cycle, Das Rheingold. This season, St.

Britten’s only Shakespeare opera was a last-minute commission to celebrate the opening of the refurbished Jubilee Hall at the 1960 Aldeburgh Festival. Despite the narrow timescale, Britten and his collaborator and partner Peter Pears notoriously strove to adhere to the sixteen-century dramatic text as closely as possible. Only a handful of Shakespeare’s original lines were substantially modified.

When one sets off to the opera to attend what is usually called a ‘double bill’, one will, most of the time, expect to see two operas clearly contrasting in character. More unusual is to find two extremely different works, hardly sharing anything between themselves, presented in a reading that digs deep for any possible echoes.