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Alexander Shelley conducts a contemplative programme featuring Strauss' Four Last Songs and Death and Transfiguration. 

An unforgettable evening at the Met as John Dexter's production of Poulenc's masterpiece is revived to close the season. 

Kirill Petrenko’s second night at Carnegie Hall packed a punch as the orchestra of the Bayerische Staatsoper delved deep into Strauss’ score, supporting an impressive cast of singers.

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.

A thought-provoking production and killer cast make San Francisco Opera's Elektra top-notch music drama.

The Met revived Beethoven's only opera Fidelio with a strong cast and excellent chorus and orchestra, with a production that celebrates liberty and love.

People who claim that opera is nothing more than a glorified pantomime would have their prejudices confirmed at Deutsche Oper Berlin's Un ballo in maschera. This is, however, high praise. It’s an evening of camp entertainment, not a philosophy lesson.

Evelyn Herlitzius and Adrianne Pieczonka are unsinkable in the the French director's final production, conducted with impressive symphonic sweep by Daniel Barenboim. 

The late director Patrice Chéreau's last work, Elektra, was brilliantly realized at the Met, with special credit to conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen and soprano Nina Stemme.

Elektra, as performed during the Deutsche Oper Berlin Strauss-Wochen: Such gorgeous music, we will all want to dance ourselves to death.

After showing in 13 theatres around the world, Robert Carsen’s Dialogues des carmélites returns again to Amsterdam, where it was premiered in 1997. Almost 20 years on, its finale remains a shattering theatrical experience.

To celebrate its 50th birthday Dutch National Opera put on a festive tribute to the people that have made it the innovative and much-admired house it is today.

Adrianne Pieczonka and Anett Fritsch shone in an otherwise disappointing opening night, impaired by poor conducting and unimpressive staging.

Last night’s performance, the second after a serious casting face-lift held to that tradition, and was very well received despite its inherent flaws, thanks to some very fine singing.

A dark and minimalist staging doesn't quite fire Wagner's Flying Dutchman into life at the Royal Opera House, despite worthy performances from Bryn Terfel, Adrianne Pieczonka and others under the direction of Andris Nelsons.

A revival of the new production of Die Frau ohne Schatten at the Munich Opera Festival brings back four of the principals in a brilliantly sung performance of Richard Strauss' masterpiece.

The Canadian Opera Company’s update of A Masked Ball to the 1960s, Kennedy-era Boston, while problematic, is actually based on Verdi’s experience of staging his first production a hundred years earlier. Verdi’s score flows right into the heart, and Adrianne Pieczonka is irresistible.

In the Royal Opera revival of Richard Strauss’s Elektra, the overwhelming theme is blood, both metaphorical and literal.

Francis Poulenc’s 1957 opera Dialogues des Carmélites has the virtues of necessity. Director Robert Carsten’s production puts these virtues before us in simple black and white. The virtues begin with the story: Blanche, an aristocrat afraid of the French Revolution who hopes to find refuge in a nunnery, becomes a refugee of religious persecution, and chooses to die a martyr with her sisters.

For any opera lover, a first visit to Bayreuth is something of a pilgrimage to the holy land. Musically, I wasn’t disappointed, as the Dutchman’s leitmotif rose softly from the invisible orchestra, soon to be enveloped by the swirling storm brewed up by Wagner and conductor Christian Thielemann.

Read our review of Giancarlo del Monaco's production of Verdi's Simon Boccanegra in its 2010 broadcast from the Met Opera in New York.

La primera jornada de la tetralogía El anillo del nibelungo se presenta en el Real bajo la dirección de Heras-Casado y Robert Carsen en una producción que cuenta con un reparto de lujo.

Das Haus am Ring feiert die Jubiläumsvorstellung mit wienerischem Überschwang.

Pasión, dulzura y dolor embriagan la interpretación de Adrianne Pieczonka y Wolfram Rieger del Winterreise de Schubert en el quinto recital del XXV Ciclo de Lied en el Teatro de la Zarzuela.

La magnífica producción de Elektra creada por Patrice Cheréau llega al Liceu bajo la dirección musical de Josep Pons, que al frente de la orquesta del teatro y junto a las voces de Herlitzius, Pieczonka y Meier recrean con gran éxito una de las parituras más bellas del s. XX.

Trotz ihres Alters überwältigt Herbert Wernickes Inszenierung bis heute mit gewaltiger Bildsprache, doch gerade reduziertes Bühnenbild bedarf umso feinerer Personenregie.