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Manfred Schweigkofler's production places the drama in a surreal, timeless atmosphere at the Teatro San Carlo. 

Dmitri Tcherniakov’s staging of Rusalka in Naples has a starkly modern visual style which occasionally dilutes the story’s emotional impact.

The Teatro di San Carlo opens its season with Vasily Barkhatov directing a Gen X mish-mash take on Puccini's final opera. 

Director Federico Tiezzi's production offered an intimate interpretation of the second opera in the Ring cycle.

An all-Russian programme from Alexander Malofeev and Dan Ettinger, held at the Teatro Politeama in Naples as the San Carlo is temporarily closed for refurbishment.

Argentinian film director Damián Szifron's production is lauded in Naples, as are star soloists Anita Rachvelishvili and Brian Jagde.

Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier’s production has undergone a year of expert scrutiny before this well-sung revival. 

A devilishly fun performance of Gounod's take on Goethe, saved when Mandy Fredrich flew in at short notice to take over the role of Marguerite. 

Despite a great cast led by Marina Rebeka, La Fura dels Baus's unambitious approach to the myth of Faust and Dan Ettinger's noisy conducting prevent a brighter season opening at the Teatro Real.

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.

Marble and solitude: Willy Decker's view of La clemenza di Tito is revived with a strong cast at L'Opéra de Paris.

An icy female ruler, three chaotic cabinet ministers, questionable hand-holding - it could only be Puccini's last opera in a revivial of Serban's gorgeous 1984 production.

Any production of Le nozze di Figaro in which both Marcellina and Barbarina give star performances is ensemble casting at its finest.

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.

Both the music and the plot are heavily revised in Nunes' imagining of Rossini's final opera. But great performances and a coherent concept earned this unusual production a well-deserved standing ovation.

A great deal of the audience were in the house for La traviata last night for the chance to see Diana Damrau and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. They will not have been disappointed: these were performances of the very highest quality by two very fine singers, with Francesco Demuro all but matching them.

There were some not-to-be-missed performances last evening in Verdi’s Otello at the Staatsoper.Dmitri Hvorostovsky is a god amongst men whose interpretation of Iago, Otello’s villainous ensign, was completely on the mark. Resplendent in his white ponytail, black leather and tattoos, he completely embodied the treacherous scoundrel bent on Otello’s destruction.

Although written many years before Rossini's The Barber of Seville, the story of The Marriage of Figaro is in fact the sequel to that of the later opera. This farcical masterpiece of the opera buffa style was the first of three operas Mozart worked on with the Italian librettist Lorenzo da Ponte and was a risky undertaking.

Carmen is one of the most frequently performed operas in the world, and with such a variety of interpretations out there it is always difficult to come up with a new one which is simultaneously inventive and effective.

Rigoletto is what an opera promoter might describe as a "banker": it's a safe bet to get those seats filled and keep the audience happy. There's a rare blend of gorgeously beautiful music allied to darkly nasty drama that gives the opera enormous, continuing appeal.