Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | James Cleverton

Composer-librettist Adamo does full justice to Louisa May Alcott's 19th-century bestseller, one of the most widely read works in American literature.

Director Francesco Micheli undersells Handel in this Glyndebourne debut, but there's plenty of froth to keep the audience entertained. 

Sir Mark Elder conducts The Hallé in a stirring semi-staged production of Madama Butterfly.

Following success in New York and Madrid, Oropesa gives Covent Garden a Violetta that will be difficult to better.

Phelim McDermott's popular staging of Satyagraha, which verges on the lush and the voluptuous, is revived to open English National Opera's season.

Amid all the18th-century flummery, contemporary touches abound as the OHP's post-pandemic season opens. 

A good, honest staging and solid singing add up to an excellent new production – its third – at Opera Holland Park. 

Daniel Kramer’s direction is a model of restraint compared to some of his earlier work for the company.

Philip Glass' hypnotic opera returns in Phelim McDermott's outstanding production that respects the solemn, statuesque grandeur and epic ritual of the score. 

Antonio Pappano and the Royal Opera Orchestra get the Ring cycle off to a blazing start; unusually, it's Lise Davidsen and the female cast who take the vocal honours.

A spirited account of Verdi's early opera in its first professional UK staging, nowhere near as “ugly” as Verdi would have had us believe. 

A convincing outing for Leoncavallo's rarely performed tale of adultery, populated by characters who are flesh and blood and are immediately recognisable today.

Luis Buñuel's derision at the sense of entitlement of over-privileged, self-righteous prigs shines through a high quality operatic adaptation.

The Royal Opera's first revival of George Benjamin's medieval shocker is characterised by stellar singing performances, notably from Barbara Hannigan and Iestyn Davies.

Scottish Opera’s boutique touring production of The Elixir of Love is a fun-filled delight. Fine singing, perfect comic timing, all to a score for just five players. It worked a treat.

Perhaps not a masterpiece, but worth exploring, Mascagni's Iris returns to Opera Holland Park. 

Phelim McDermott tackles Philip Glass's ancient Egypt in a production that's totally absorbing visually and aurally, with a star performance by Anthony Roth Costanzo.

This traditional production of Patience was strongly sung and acted and was a joyful evening.

At Garsington Opera, Richard Strauss' Intermezzo presents an utterly compelling picture of a mature marriage with its joys and trials; Mary Dunleavy brings it to life with a top class piece of acting.

Take an exquisite production of a Puccini tearjerker, cast it attractively… then crush its fragile wings under the weight of the Albert Hall’s vastness.

Alice's story in a sparkling outdoor production for families, which will not disappoint mainstream opera enthusiasts.

The Irish première of John Adams' Nixon in China results in an inspiring and triumphant evening in Dublin. 

Francesca Zambello's huge, ambitious production returns once again to the Royal Albert Hall, with lavish costumes, excellent choreography and riotous crowd scenes which will charm children in particular. 

Military service brutalises. If you’re in any doubt about this, Berg’s short opera Wozzeck should dispel them, and particularly so in Carrie Cracknell’s new production for ENO.

Among the fourteen Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, it must be acknowledged that there are glimpses of weakness. The Gondoliers maintains one of Gilbert’s typically insane plots, which is best described as ‘topsy-turvy’ until the final scene, when order is restored. Likewise the music is far from Sullivan’s strongest score, but there are moments of inspired vocal writing.

Hijacking, murder and terror on the high seas: you might expect that The Death of Klinghoffer, John Adams's 1991 opera about the Palestinian hijacking of the cruise liner Achille Lauro has all the makings of a pot-boiling thriller. But you would be wrong: Adams and his librettist Alice Goodman have other fish to fry.