Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Seth Carico

An ambitious effort to honor hometown hero Otakar Ostrčil sags under its own weight at the Prague National Theatre. 

At MusikTheater an der Wien, Miroslav Srnka’s new opera provess a deeply compelling, meticulously crafted work. It may not uplift, but it sears itself into the memory.

Christof Loy unearths hidden treasure with an opera by Franz Schreker long since buried after taking Europe by storm in the 1920s.

Claus Guth’s Don Giovanni returns to Amsterdam with an almost entirely new cast with strong leads by Seth Carico and Adrian Sâmpetrean. 

Meyerbeer's tale of the Anabaptist rebellion in the 16th-century religious wars proves to be a powerful thriller, with Clémentine Margaine and Gregory Kunde leading a very strong singing cast.

Jonathan Dove's lean reduction of Wagner’s score for just 18 players is performed at the Grimeborn Festival in Julia Burbach's staging. 

The passion of Alban Berg's music under Donald Runnicles fights against a disjointed production by Ole Anders Tandberg.

Peter Seiffert can still impress as Tristan, but Graham Vick's staging is uncertain and unconvincing. 

Dead Man Walking is currently the most frequently performed contemporary American opera. Joel Ivany's staging, first mounted in Vancouver, opened recently at Minnesota Opera just days after the opera's Spanish première in Madrid. 

Oliver Py's new Meyerbeer staging offers plenty of clichés, but is a solid show, backed up by a fine musical performance.

The production was interesting but at times distracting, but the musical performances triumphed. 

Powerful performances in Götz Friedrich's Deutsche Oper production. 

Benjamin Britten's Death in Venice at the Deutsche Oper Berlin in an outstanding new production by Graham Vick and Donald Runnicles.

Visually inconsistant but some mesmerising perfromances in Kirsten Harms' production. 

A modern updating of Vasco da Gama's discovery of a sea route to India? Vera Nemirova's stylish production of Meyerbeer's Grand Opéra works inteligently for the most part. 

Puccini's La fanciulla del West gets a modern update at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

A strong cast headed by Peter Seiffert perform in this visually appealing Tannhäuser at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin, where Markus Brück excels as Wolfram and Petra Maria Schnitzer takes on the role of the temptress Venus and the saintly Elisabeth.

What makes this production of The Rape of Lucretia stand out is the singers’ acting. It’s immediate, it’s integrated into the singing, and it’s better than anything I’ve seen in any opera production before. 

A respectable performance by Deutsche Oper Berlin, raised to another level by Nina Stemme in the title role

Though it has run for 45 years, the Deutsche Oper Berlin’s Tosca is both timeless and a relic. Stand-in tenor Stefano La Colla's impassioned performance drew a standing ovation. 

Le nozze di Figaro in Götz Friedrich’s vintage production at the Deutsche Oper Berlin provides an entertaining evening. 

Offenbach’s opera The Tales of Hoffmann received a makeover Wednesday night in the world première performance of Anne Champert’s adaptation, Hoffmann. Eschewing the traditional for the phantasmagoric, Hoffmann puts the strangeness of E.T.

The Fort Worth Opera closed their 2012 Festival on Sunday afternoon with the second of two performances of Mark Adamo’s Lysistrata, or the Nude Goddess. After hearing a strong Marriage of Figaro at the festival Friday evening, I had fairly high expectations, some of which were met, others not.

Musikalisch überzeugend, aber aufgrund der fehlenden Regie bleiben viele Absurditäten und der abgründige Schabernack auf der Strecke.

Mit enormer Ausdruckskraft verleiht Evelyn Herlitzius den zwei Seiten der Emilia Marty stimmlich und darstellerisch nuancierte Gestalt.