Performer: Craig Smith

A great return appearance for English Touring Opera's Puccini double bill opening its spring tour at the Hackney Empire.

Blanche McIntyre's new production for ETO proves a disappointment, saddled with a trip hazard of a set. 

English Touring Opera gives Gluck's reformist masterpiece a suitably blood-spattered outing in a production which keeps the opera in touch with its classical roots. 

Donizetti's back catalogue proves just as rich as his well-loved works, with this blisteringly good foray into an extraordinary opera whose UK premiere is 179 undeserved years late. 

Donizetti’s Il furioso all’isola di San Domingo hasn’t strayed onto UK shores for decades, but is given a spirited performance by English Touring Opera. 

Written half a century before the verismo movement, Donizetti paints a true-to-life portrait of a besieged people which is genuinely touching. James Conway's straightforward production features some notable individual singers and an excellent performance by the chorus.