Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Rachelle Durkin

Neil Armfield's enchanting production of Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream finally comes to Australia as the centrepiece of the 2021 Adelaide Festival, making a virtue of necessity with its astute casting of Australian talent.

Confusion has such lovely music! Sydney's pioneering Baroque and early classical opera specialists, Pinchgut Opera offered Haydn's Armida as its 16th production. 

One’s upbringing to respect the elderly is challenged in a farcical, not so far-fetched family matter in Opera Australia’s Don Pasquale.

The Met’s playful production of Rossini’s great, loveable and busy La Cenerentola is back and in excellent hands. Joyce DiDonato's Cinderella, singing the role at the Met for the first time is perfect.

In a sense, the plot of Don Pasquale is timeless: it concerns an old man who comes between young lovers and meets his comeuppance.

In his director’s note, Jonathan Biggins writes, ‘All I can hope for is that you go out of the theatre feeling a bit more cheerful than when you came in’. If that was the opera’s aim, then few could claim that it was not successful in achieving it. The ABC’s Limelight magazine describes the production as ‘a razor sharp, satirical romp that’s camper than a row of tents and twice as funny’.

Read our review of Cesare Lievi's production of Rossini­'s Cenerentola in its 2009 broadcast from the Met Opera in New York.