Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Dominica Matthews

Siobhan Stagg is an outstanding Susanna in a strongly cast and well produced Marriage of Figaro at the Sydney Opera House

Dean Bryant's production of Leonard Bernstein’s operetta leans more towards musical theatre, blending French period costumes with weak attempts at Aussie humour. 

An icy Götterdämmerung brings Opera Australia's Ring Cycle to a successful conclusion, with standout performances from Lise Lindstrom as Brünnhilde and Andrea Silvestrelli as Hagen.

The second part of Opera Australia's Ring Cycle sees digital effects employed with greater restraint, delivering a production that is by turns moving and thrilling. 

The opening Opera Australia's much-delayed Ring cycle contains wonderful visuals, and a standout performance from Warwick Fyfe as Alberich, but also moments of bafflement and excess.

Ravishing music and performances, a crazy G&S plot, but physicality that tends to distract in Constantine Costi's production.

A beautiful 17th-century setting does nothing to dim the freshness and relevance of Sir David McVicar's production for Opera Australia.

A brilliantly staged production of Reimann's Ghost Sonata by Opera Australia shows once again that modernist opera can be compelling if a provocative story is rendered by an outstanding cast.

A successful concert performance of Umberto Giordano's verismo hit in Sydney, with a trio of international stars. 

Opera Australia delivers a sensational new Elena Kats-Chernin opera about the immensely gifted and troubled Australian painter, Brett Whiteley.

A much-loved 1991 production evoking Fellini’s post-war glamour and grime is revived with three talented young principals, including Mongolian baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat in the title role.

Kentridge’s use of video technology creates another, highly complex, visual score next to Berg’s sonic one.

Having offered a strong feminist reading of Wagner's Ring, could Kasper Holten do the same again for Die Meistersinger? Opera Australia's co-production had moments of excellence, but ultimately left the viewer with more questions than answers

The quality cast purred, but glorious roars are required to jolt audiences from placid enjoyment of Opera Australia’s gorgeous 24-year-old production of this Verdi classic.

As clearly visible on all photos, the Sydney Opera House has two “sails”, interconnected major sections. One of them houses concerts, the other operas. Opera performances, however, are not exclusively taking place in the Opera Theatre.

It's the libretto's equivocation that has denied King Roger the frequency of performance that its music deserves.

Damiano Michieletto's inspired intertwining of the standard double-bill of Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci makes for vivid storytelling, the whole supported by an excellent cast solidly directed by Andrea Licata.

The final instalment of the Melbourne Ring is vividly brought to life by excellent singing, an adaptable set, and committed playing from the pit.

On a night of technical delays and extraordinary singing, Opera Australia's revival of Die Walküre is particularly memorable for Amber Wagner's Sieglinde and Lise Lindstrom's Brünnhilde.

The revival of Neil Armfield's Melbourne Ring is relaunched with a successful Rheingold, sensitively conducted by Pietari Inkinen, with an especially fine performance from Warwick Fyfe as Alberich.

Plush costumes and lavish sets make up for shortfall in music and singing in Opera Australia’s La traviata. 

David McVicar's production of Faust enjoys one of the strongest overall performances of Opera Australia in recent times.

Opera Australia’s Falstaff in Melbourne brings freshness to this almost 20-year-old production. Contributing to its success is an outstanding Falstaff...

Kasper Holten's innovative production of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin comes to Sydney, with Nicole Car outstanding as Tatyana.

‘To lose one singer, Mr Terracini, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose two, one of them in the title role, looks like … a disaster’. Such were the thoughts running through my head when the Artistic Director of Opera Australia made the pre-performance announcement.

I left the Sydney Opera House last night feeling vaguely dissatisfied, and yet a bit puzzled at my dissatisfaction. La Traviata is chock-full of Verdi’s most glorious music, and well though I know the score, I wasn’t feeling in the least jaded to begin with.

Tragedy seems to age better than comedy. The works of Aeschylus have been more influential than those of Aristophanes, and Shakespeare’s darker plays are far more popular than his pure comedies. This same propensity for gloomy subjects can also be seen in the opera world.

There is nowhere to hide in Madama Butterfly. It is a well-known opera, contains very little in terms of stage action and changing scenery, is intensely lyrical in its vocal writing, and its orchestral writing is exposed. None of these factors bothered Opera Australia in their latest production, which was superb from beginning to end in every respect.

Korngold’s Die tote Stadt is an extraordinary opera, an often underrated masterpiece of the 20th century. On the face of it, it has a simple plot – the protagonist Paul, unable to overcome the death of his wife, falls in love with another woman, Marietta, similar to his dead wife in many ways.

From the opening bars of the Overture of Opera Australia’s production of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro it was clear that this was going to be a production with a difference. As the orchestra began, the curtain raised to reveal a room, painted in brilliant white, with clothes rails at either end containing maids’ costumes.

Opera Australia’s production of the Rossini magnum opus The Barber of Seville is a period piece, featuring an era a century later than the one in which it was composed. In this revival of Elijah Moshinsky’s production, director Cathy Dadd masterfully transports the action from the classical period of the 1810s to the silent movies of the 1910s.