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Individual performances impress, but conducting and production both prove too meandering in this year’s Wagner Days Tannhäuser.

Andreas Schager is the main reason to catch the latest revival of Otto Schenk's ultra-traditional Tannhäuser.

Soloists Klaus Florian Vogt, Christian Gerhaher, Amber Wagner and Marina Prudenskaya star in Act 3 of Tannhäuser.

Albery's production allows the opera to speak for itself, although sluggish pacing in the pit detract from the musical merits of this revival. 

Soprano Alexandra Shiner displays extraordinary vocal promise and stage presence across a host of Wagner's great female roles.

Yesterday, the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, where devotees of Richard Wagner converge annually from all over the world, opened its doors again for this year’s festival. Traditionally presented on the first evening, the new production for this season was Tannhäuser und der Sängerkrieg auf Wartburg (to use the opera’s full name), presented to a capacity audience.

Orchestra and chorus reach great Wagnerian heights in this new production by Christof Loy, a study of an artist in revolt against hypocritical sexual mores.

Stephen Gould is less than convincing in the lead role of Tannhäuser, but excellent ensemble work under Ádám Fischer's inspired direction offers compensations.

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

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

A milestone event in the short life of Melbourne Opera has been a production of Tannhäuser in which soprano Lee Abrahmsen was outstanding as Elisabeth.

Longborough Festival Opera’s new production of Wagner’s Tannhäuser is impressive vocally but particularly distinguished by Anthony Negus’s intelligent and vital conducting.

Canadian soprano Jennifer Maines as a demure Venus, and German soprano Josefine Weber as a chaste Elizabeth, were the outstanding singers at this Innsbruck performance of Tannhäuser.

Tim Albery's 2010 production of Tannhäuser, receiving its first revival at Covent Garden, begins with a stylish opening 20 minutes, but thereafter things become rather bland. 

The Met brought back its traditional staging of Tannhäuser with remarkable performances by the Orchestra, Chorus and soloists, with two outstanding male singers.

The lack of shock value in Calixto Bieito’s interpretation of Wagner's Tannhäuser premiering at the Vlaamse Opera in Ghent could almost be seen as a disappointment. All the more surprising then was the romantic intimacy created in this superlatively sung production.

Amber Wagner sings Elisabeth with a deepened command and an access to a horizon of sound that make it seem as though her throat had found six more inches of release. It’s a phenomenal performance.

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.

Art installation of a biogas factory is the setting for a mostly undistinguished musical performance.

Eva-Maria Höckmayr's brilliantly unsettling double vision of Tannhäuser sees our hero both being, and watching himself being overwhelmed by psychic anguish, appalled at the futility of pleasure, and tortured by his savage envy of salvation. 

Tenor Daniel Frank impressed in the title role in the Prague State Opera's new Tannhäuser, directed by Andrejs Žagars – but the production itself suffered from a lack of interpretation and inventiveness.

Dortmund Opera's daring new production of Tannhäuser is deeply stimulating and innovative, backed up by fine singing and orchestral playing.

Peter Konwitschny’s Tannhäuser at Dresden’s Semperoper dates back to 1997, making it relatively old for an opera production, and though I sense this may be its last revival, it is still modern and engaging.

In Act II of Tannhäuser, Hermann, Landgrave of Thuringia, sets the theme of the singing contest that is about to take place in his hall by asking: “Can you describe love’s nature to me?” To some extent, the entire opera is an examination of two very different answers to that question.

It is customary in German-speaking countries to perform Wagner’s Parsifal on Good Friday, so it was quite a bold move for the Semperoper in Dresden to put on Tannhäuser instead, especially in Peter Konwitschny’s strongly anti-Christian production.

My last opera of the year was also my first Wagner: a new Covent Garden production of Tannhäuser, directed by Tim Albery and conducted by Semyon Bychkov.First things first: Bychkov was magnificent.