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No hippos in tutus for The Dance of the Hours, but panto frolics abound in Stephen Madcalf's staging in the idyllic Theatre in the Woods. 

While Bellini’s two-act opera Norma underscores the religious wars between the ancient Druids and Romans, it also highlights an emotive personal conflict that is veiled in deceit and cultural discrepancy.

The ninth revival of Jonathan Kent’s production features a great Act 1 and enjoyable Covent Garden role debuts for the three top singers, but misses the mark on the set pieces.

The winter revival of the Met’s opening night Norma brought a new conductor and new stars in the main two female roles.

Sondra Radvanovsky scores a rousing success in the taxing title role of Bellini's masterpiece in New York.

Woefully stiff acting lets down an otherwise excellent production; Joseph Calleja impresses in his role début as Cavaradossi.

The Lyric Opera’s new production of Carmen is lusciously embodied, with expressionistic splashes of colour against a quasi-modern backdrop. 

Àlex Ollé and his Fura dels Baus team stage a spectacular looking Norma, the first new production of Bellini's opera at Covent Garden for nearly 30 years. 

Paula Murrihy's role debut in Frankfurt not only proves to be infatuating, but also irresistibly cool.

The Met brought back a 20-year-old traditional production of Simon Boccanegra with a starry cast led by James Levine.

If the production is full of pleasures, they do not immediately or obviously connect to a sense of some larger plan, which might have been helped along with a more dynamic set.

Bavarian State Opera celebrate the opening of the 2015/16 season with Arrigo Boito's opera Mefistofele

Joseph Calleja and Anna Netrebko show off their vocal qualities, leading a star cast above an uninspiring orchestral performance in John Copley's Royal Opera production of La bohème in what is to be its last season.

The Met's revival of Lucia di Lammermoor was a collaborative success, with singers, orchestra and chorus cohering well.  

Strong playing and singing aren't enough to make the Bayerische Staatsoper's Rigoletto a compelling evening out.

A triumphant opening night was crowned by superb performances from Željko Lučić and Anna Netrebko as Macbeth and his Lady. But why the negative audience reaction to Adrian Noble's intelligent production? 

Anna Netrebko makes a glorious role debut as Lady Macbeth in a revival of Martin Kušej's jumbled production of Verdi's first Shakespeare opera.

Joyce DiDonato, Carmen Giannattasio and Joseph Calleja star in a superb concert performance of Donizetti's Maria Stuarda at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. 

Hans von Bülow taunted that Verdi’s Requiem was just another of his operas “in ecclesiastical garb’”. It’s difficult to disagree when dispatched with as much operatic fervour as Antonio Pappano mustered here. 

The new Traviata at the Lyric Opera is both hyper-traditional and, in moments, saucily modern. In broad strokes, it looks like many another Traviata that has come before, though a twinge of visual ambition goes past such clichés.

Georges Bizet’s first major opera, composed and performed in Paris when he was a mere 25, has the dubious distinction of being both a success and a flop, depending on who is asked. Audiences at the première loved it, but critics panned it.

With the business situation in the recording industry being what it is, studio recordings of operas are more or less ruled out. The positive side of this is that the general public gets the chance to be part of concerts that are recorded and enjoy the tension such an event creates more often.

There was more than a little drama at Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja’s sold-out concert recital in Dublin’s National Concert Hall this evening. He was joined by Irish soprano Claudia Boyle and the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Proinnsías Ó Duinn.

This past Saturday night at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, opera superstars Anna Netrebko and Joseph Calleja successfully transformed an otherwise ordinary, four-star La Bohème at the Lyric into an extraordinary, five-star experience.

Tenor Joseph Calleja, conductor Giuliano Carella and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra presented an interesting choice of repertoire on Monday. The composers were celebrated Italian and French masters of opera, and the programme alternated between overtures for orchestra and arias starring Calleja.

The Last Night of the Proms isn’t really a concert at all; it’s two very different concerts put on one after the other. The first is something like what we’re used to from a Prom, with big-name soloists performing alongside the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Symphony Chorus in world premières and classic works from the repertoire.

An old proverb names Munich as the northernmost city in Italy. As odd as this may seem, it makes some sense when considering the arches of the mock-Italian loggia in Odeonsplatz, modeled after the one in the Piazza della Signoria in Florence.

After years of opera going, is it really still possible for me to be moved to tears by a tenor’s wail at the sight of a consumptive heroine dying tunefully in her bed at the end of the last act? I didn’t think so, but on the basis of last night’s Covent Garden performance of La Bohème, the answer would appear to be yes.

The Proms Choral Sundays series moved from last week’s dramatic opening (Havergal Brian’s Gothic Symphony) to the more familiar but no less spectacular territory of Verdi’s Requiem. Since 1956, this has been a Proms regular, with 16 previous performances, including a run of five in the eight years from 1956 to 1963.

Read our review of Mary Zimmerman's production of ­Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor in its 2011 broadcast from the Met Opera in New York.

Sous la direction convaincante de Gustavo Dudamel, l'interprétation de Saioa Hernández est remarquable dans le rôle-titre, mais une direction d'acteur erratique et la petite forme de Joseph Calleja tempèrent le succès espéré.

El Teatro Real estrena con gran éxito su última producción de esta temporada: una Tosca que destacó por la barroca puesta en escena de Paco Azorín en el primer acto y la voz de Sondra Radvanovsky, quien deslumbró con un "Vissi d'arte" histórico.

Joseph Calleja als Herzog von Mantua und Christoph Maltman in der Titelpartie: einen Abend wie diesen gibt es nicht alle Tage.

Die Münchner Tosca zog ihren Reiz aus dem exzellenten Sängeraufgebot und dem packenden Dirigat von Daniele Callegari. Die Münchner Inszenierung von Luc Bondy blieb unterm Strich sehr konventionell.

Dieses Jahr wurde Verdis I due Foscari ins Programm genommen, eine Oper, die trotz einiger musikalisch interessanten Momenten nicht zu Verdis Meisterwerken zählt und in Salzburg vor allem aufgrund einer durchwachsenen Besetzung nicht überzeugen konnte.

Requiem bien peu vibrant aux Chorégies d'Orange. La Messe des morts de Verdi paralysée entre une image omniprésente et une qualité musicale insuffisante. 

Dirigentin Keri-Lynn Wilson und Hui He als Butterfly machen die ansonsten solide Inszenierung der Madama Butterfly zu einem Erlebnis. Joseph Calleja kann als Pinkerton lediglich einen blassen Eindruck hinterlassen.