Performer: Fleur de Bray

Opera Holland Park's traditionally staged Cenerentola has plenty of sparkle and a fine cast of talented singers.

Ailyn Bozok's minimlaist production of Delibes' Lakmé at Opera Holland Park contains much tender beauty and is carried by fine musical performances. 

Third Hand's innovative use of puppets within opera pays off in this gloriously dramatic and visually exciting adventure, inspired by and set within the mythology of Shetland.

Mozart’s original The Magic Flute is bizarre enough. The story of a prince and a bird-catcher’s journey to save a princess they’ve never met from a sinister quasi-Freemason who turns out to be alright, it is sufficiently packed full of great songs and good humour to have become an enduring repertory favourite – but that doesn’t mean it makes any sense. It doesn’t, really. It is a daft opera.

How much wine can a cast pretend to drink over the course of one production? If such a record has been set Adam Spreadbury-Maher, Ben Cooper and Robin Norton-Hale’s Don Giovanni presents a good challenge. For much of this production characters, music and set seemed drunk on wine and melodrama, high on the drug of their own confident style – but all were ultimately weakened by their instability.