Performer: Oliver Mears

Sir Mark Elder celebrates 50 years at Covent Garden by returning to his first opera there in 1976 – Verdi's Rigoletto – in a revival of Oliver Mears' excellent 2021 production.

Oliver Mears' new staging impresses and Jakub Hrůša's first season as Music Director excites interest. But the evening belongs to Anna Netrebko.

Superb Handelian singing and intense character acting light up Handel’s Semele, staged as a stark, uncompromising indictment of the rich and powerful. 

Director of Opera, Oliver Mears, was filmed trying to remove a Palestine flag raised by a performer during the final curtain call for Il trovatore. RBO has since said their “goal is to act with integrity and compassion.”

Covent Garden's Director of Opera talks about directing opera, moving from a start-up to a behemoth and how The Royal Opera hopes to exit from the pandemic.