Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Anna Starushkevych

There was a celebratory atmosphere to launch the 2022 festival, including royal fireworks and coronation anthems, but it was Ukrainian mezzo Anna Starushkevych who provided the evening's most moving moment. 

Ann Hallenberg shines in an amazing cast in a concert performance of Handel's Ottone in Vienna. 

Intended to signify the contribution of Russian music to the Western canon, the Royal Choral Society gave admirable performances of two major choral works, rarely heard in Winchester Cathedral.

This small, fun, fast-paced comedy, probably the UK première of Salieri's neglected fairytale, makes for a glorious garden opera evening at Bampton (and touring). 

A beautiful evening of rare and royal music by Gluck, in the year of his 300th anniversary, and even an even rarer setting of Orfeo by Bertoni: it was just a pity we couldn't follow all the words, as well as all the notes, at St John's Smith Square.

Despite a relatively easy-to-follow storyline, Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro is an opera that is hard to pull off entirely successfully. Musically, it requires enormous vigour from both cast and orchestra; dramatically, this opera buffa demands strong acting skills in order to eke out its moments of farce.

The final of this year’s Handel Singing Competition, which opened the 2012 London Handel Festival, was a rare occasion when the winner of the First Prize matched the winner of the Audience Prize, giving satisfaction all round.

A cold and rainy Wednesday evening in Leeds is not usually the setting for lust, betrayal, and murder. I found myself at the Clothworkers Centenary Concert Hall at the University of Leeds ready to experience the UK premiere of Act I of Sergey Taneyev’s masterpiece Oresteia, first performed at the Mariinsky Theatre in 1895.