Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Ferruccio Furlanetto

Short of the three lead stars of its opening, The Royal Opera's La forza del destino remains a thrilling evening, powered by Christof Loy's interesting staging and virile singing from Christopher Maltman.

The hottest opera ticket in London this season sees Jonas Kaufmann and Anna Netrebko reunited on the Royal Opera House's stage for the first time since 2008. It was worth the wait. 

Yannick Nézet-Séguin’s proves the highlight of a frustrating evening at The Metropolitan Opera

An impressively cast revival for Verdi's one-time neglected masterpiece at Covent Garden.

Massanet’s Don Quichotte is mounted by Opera Australia, in a production which creaks but is held together by fine singing from Ferruccio Furlanetto and Warwick Fyfe.

The Met Opera's concert performance of Verdi's Requiem was an emotional tribute to Dmitri Hvorostovsky. 

Were it not for a sterling musical display, built on the shoulders of bass Ferruccio Furlanetto and conductor Myung-whun Chung, this could have been a very long night indeed.

For the latest revival of Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier's candy-striped production, the Royal Opera serves up the operatic equivalent of stodgy semolina.

Furlanetto and Domingo give their all in leading a starry cast, but the stage direction fails to ignite.

The Met brought back a 20-year-old traditional production of Simon Boccanegra with a starry cast led by James Levine.

Would a younger soprano taking the role of Tatyana blur Kasper Holten's "dancing doubles" vision of Eugene Onegin at the Royal Opera House?

Tchaikovsky’s passionate drama is put into the deep-freeze by chilly stage designs.

Bravo to the Haus am Ring for a bloody good night of music, drama and beauty – an excellent first première of the season.

Giuseppe Verdi’s Don Carlos has finally arrived, for the first time in the 21st century, as a much anticipated highlight of Opera Australia’s current season. 

Great singing from veterans and some visually stunning effects light up the Met's revival of Hytner's 2010 production of Verdi's Don Carlo.

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.

Khovanshchina offers ample opportunity for massive, haunting and grandiose vocal display,  beautifully realized by a remarkable cast led by Ain Anger, Elena Maximova and Ferruccio Furlanetto.

A concert of many virtues, laying bare Verdi's music only made it better. James Conlon conducts I vespri siciliani in Madrid.

Don Quichotte makes its Canadian Opera Company debut in triumphant fashion, offering an elegant visual feast in addition to a trio of magnificent, magnetic performances.

Matthew Richard Martinez reviews San Diego Opera's season-closing production of Massenet's Don Quixote starring Ferruccio Furlanetto.

Mussorgsky’s rich, complex music and Boris Godunov’s tragic story is told with very original vision in Tugan Sokhiev’s concert version. The Salle Pleyel made no mistake about it: this Boris will stay in our memories for a while.

Cirque du Soleil producer Franco Dragone's new Aida for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples aimed to scrub off all the bombast from this triumphalistic work. The eccentricities of the production led to a poor-quality outcome, though there was some fine singing.

Last night’s Covent Garden revival of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra was a study in time slips. On stage, there is the 25 year slip between the end of the prologue, when Simon is named Doge of Genoa, and the dramatic events of Act I. There is the 24 year gap between the disastrous première of the original opera and the triumph of the heavily revised 1881 version.

Ferruccio Furlanetto, dressed in black, stands in the curve of the piano behind him, silhouetted again a blood red, velvet curtain. He raises his head at the opening piano tones and begins to sing. The audience is immediately enveloped in the kind of warm bass voice that seems to wrap itself around you like the perfect eiderdown; not too heavy and not too light, well positioned and unstrained.

An internationally acclaimed singer with a career spanning well over 30 years should be granted almost whatever role he’d like to do. It would also be understandable if the singer chose a well-known, crowd-pleasing piece, but, as is quite evident by now, Ferruccio Furlanetto is not a typical singer.

In a city where the Vienna State Opera ball is considered the climax of the carnival season and where the local news would lend itself to great libretti (were operetta still in fashion), it is not too surprising that music and theatre performances occasionally mirror the headlines.

In an attempt to persuade Attila the Hun to spare Italy from the scorch and burn policy, the corrupt Roman general Ezio says, "Avrai tu l'universo, resti l'Italia a me," ("You can have the universe, but leave Italy for me").

Read our review of Pier Luigi Samaritani's production of Verdi's Ernani in its 2012 broadcast from the Met Opera in New York.

The Proms Choral Sundays series moved from last week’s dramatic opening (Havergal Brian’s Gothic Symphony) to the more familiar but no less spectacular territory of Verdi’s Requiem. Since 1956, this has been a Proms regular, with 16 previous performances, including a run of five in the eight years from 1956 to 1963.

Read our review of Nicholas Hytner's production of Verdi­'s Don Carlo in its 2010 broadcast from the Met Opera in New York.

Beau succès pour cette reprise de La Force du destin à l’Opéra Bastille, notamment grâce à Anna Pirozzi qui, remplaçant Anna Netrebko, interprète une magnifique Leonora.

Peter Steins Inszenierung spiegelt gekonnt ein Werk wider, in dem sich musikalische Schlichtheit und üppiger Klang abwechseln.

In einer konventionellen Inszenierung, aber einem stimmungsvollen Bühnenbild stirbt in Baden-Baden Plácido Domingo als Simon Boccanegra einen würdevollen Operntod.

Tatiana Serjan sticht in einer ansonst soliden Macbeth-Inszenierug von Christian Räth hervor.

L’« opéra en robe d’ecclésiastique », s’est trouvé des voix de collection, un chef et un orchestre fabuleux ! Puissent Riccardo Chailly, son choeur et son orchestre nous en livrer encore, et longtemps !