Performer: Anne Mason

Emily Howard's new opera, an Aldeburgh Festival commission, takes an ambitiously modernist approach to a dystopian story of loneliness: a tough, but thought-provoking work. 

Problems of orchestral balance cloud Olivia Fuchs's straightforward, compelling staging of Janáček’s tirade against the rigidity and hypocrisy of small town society.

Sir David McVicar’s new production of Pelléas et Mélisande for Scottish Opera is stylish and lit like a painting.