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Ovid’s Metamorphoses makes an ideal curtain-raiser to the Academy of Ancient Music's new season, with works by Charpentier and Rameau conducted by Laurence Cummings... who also sings! 

A memorable performance, with Stephen Barlow conducting Janáček’s remarkable score with vividness and clarity, while David Alden's staging is a masterpiece of "less is more". 

Come for the shave, stay for the comedy. Christopher Luscombe's new production of Rossini's beloved opera buffa avoids overcomplicating the plot, letting the work's humour and the abilities of the principals shine. 

Garsington Opera's new production of Rossini's comic masterpiece is a bawdy hoot, but humour aside it features an ensemble who provide first-class bel canto singing.

Purcell's counterpoint is beautifully sung by a young cast to inaugurate England's latest country house opera venue.

A marvellously affirmative account of The Kingdom that brought thrilling intensity and evident commitment from the combined forces of the Waynflete Singers and the BSO.

Tim Albery's production for Opera North is well sung and superbly acted, involving us deeply in Janáček's tragic family drama.

Immersive, direct and passionate Bach from English Touring Opera and the Old Street Band.

English Touring Opera’s new Radamisto took time to settle down on opening night.

A strong cast take us to the brink of damnation in Welsh National Opera’s revival of Don Giovanni.

Opera North's Little Greats festival continues with two deeply contrasting short operas - a grimly tragic and austere version of Macagni's Cavalleria rusticana and a frothy and hilarious production of Gilbert and Sullivan's Trial by Jury.

Garsington's latest Rossini buffa is on the nail orchestrally, mixed vocally and one of the best pieces of acting and stage movement you'll see in opera.

Jennifer France and Nicholas Lester are a compelling double act in Rossini’s sparkling comedy La scala di seta from Scottish Opera in Concert.

Opera North's Hansel and Gretel at the Grand Theatre Leeds, directed by Edward Dick, is witty and perceptive, with some insights provide by Freudian psychanalysis

ETO's charactistically clear, simple production conveys Homer's story with clarity, confidence, and charm – and even humour – from a fine cast, making an exciting start to fully-staged opera at Saffron Hall. 

Clever staging and a high standard of acting does much to happily while away the three hours of this baroque opera in the second of ETO's Baroque extravaganza.

The away leg of Rossini's “Italian girl - Turkish guy” fixture makes for a thoroughly enjoyable evening at Garsington, without ever quite bursting into flame.

Opera North's The Barber of Seville directed by Giles Havergal at the Grand Theatre Leeds is supremely theatrical and a classic in all senses of the word.

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

Aylin Bozok's modern and minimalist Werther, beautifully realised and superbly acted with the innovative addition of a silent character, is utterly heartbreaking.

After a hugely successful concert at last year’s Clifton International Festival of Music, Ars Eloquentiae took us on a journey back in time to the Baroque stage for “A Tale of Two Cities: London and Paris, Stage and Street” at the Clifton Cathedral.

When Emperor Überall decrees an all-pervasive war that will result in the death of his whole population, Death takes umbrage at the fact that his job is being usurped and, in the mother of all demarcation disputes, goes on strike.

A handful of times in operatic history, a composer has thrown away the rule book and produced a work which defies categorisation because it simply isn't like anything else in the repertoire. Kurt Weill's Die Dreigroschenoper is one such work: musically and dramatically, neither Weill himself or anyone else has ever written anything remotely similar.

The Royal Academy of Music has a small but beautifully refurbished theatre, the 230 seat Sir Jack Lyons Theatre, where it stages full opera performances. Although many of the seats are taken by Academy staff, performers' friends and families, talent scouts and others with specific reasons for being there, some of the tickets are available to the public.