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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.

The Three Choirs Festival opens with a performance of Dvořák’s Requiem characterised by extremes of melancholy and hope.

Tenor Nicholas Mulroy directs a one-voice-to-a-part account of Bach's St Matthew Passion, featuring some splendid singing. 

Ivor Bolton and Kit Hesketh-Harvey deliver a brilliant political thriller and anti-Putin polemic – at least for its first half.

It is clear that these women are already ripe for plucking even before Don Alfonso unleashes his dastardly plan.

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.

Stripping away all the decadence of late-19th century Vienna, Walter Sutcliffe gives Johann Strauss’ operetta an overhaul. 

Adrian Partington directs a well-managed but ultimately disjointed performance of Mahler’s most idealistically challenging symphony.

John Eliot Gardiner assembled the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists for a moving performance of JS Bach's great oratorio.

The superb Monteverdi Chorus and the English Baroque Soloists recently brought a kind a seraphic force to Bach's St Matthew Passion.

Fine orchestral and singing performances in ETO's Pelléas et Mélisande aren't enough to overcome some of the work's difficulties.

I have no objection per se with naked women bathing in blood, masturbating to crucifixes or being flagellated by priests in confessional booths, but only if it somehow aids understanding of the story

While this concert’s marketing was focused on Mozart’s Requiem, it was Haydn in the first half that made the greater impact, in the form of an ecstatically virtuosic performance of his Cello Concerto no. 1 with soloist Alban Gerhardt. Passagework was everywhere immaculately tuned and played with perfect dexterity, Gerhardt’s fingers dancing up and down the instrument with tremendous velocity.

With such a star-studded line-up at a concert that had been sold out for weeks, this was always going to be an evening to remember. Bach’s St Matthew Passion is one of those iconic pieces that never gets old, and every time I hear the throbbing bass of the opening chorus, I still get a tingle of excitement.

Northern Sinfonia’s concert in Hall One of the Sage Gateshead last night challenged the audience to put aside our normal preconceptions, to see well-known composers in a slightly different light. Mendelssohn’s “Fifth” Symphony was actually the second one he wrote – at the age of only 20 – but it was not published until after his death and is not played as much as his other symphonies.

The Holywell Music Room in Oxford, with its bright and reverberant sound, was purpose-built as a concert hall, and opened in 1748. To hear four experienced and top-class singers last night, all of whom were able to work the specifics of this unique and historic room, to sing to it and use it as their instrument, was sheer joy.