A striking Rigoletto opens Oliver Mears' account at The Royal Opera

By Mark Pullinger, 14 September 2021

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“Oropesa also happens to be the finest lyric coloratura in the world today”

Reviewed at Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London on 13 September 2021

Verdi, Rigoletto

The Royal Opera

Sir Antonio Pappano, Conductor

Oliver Mears, Director

Simon Lima Holdsworth, Set Designer

Ilona Karas, Costume Designer

Fabiana Piccioli, Lighting Designer

Carlos Álvarez, Rigoletto

Lisette Oropesa, Gilda

Liparit Avetisyan, The Duke of Mantua

Brindley Sherratt, Sparafucile

Ramona Zaharia, Maddalena

Kseniia Nikolaieva, Giovanna

Blaise Malaba, Count Ceprano

Egor Zhuravskii, Borsa

Eric Greene, Monterone

Dominic Sedgwick, Marullo

Royal Opera Chorus

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden

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Mark Pullinger

Mark has been a Bachtrack editor since 2014. He is also an experienced critic, writing hundreds of reviews for the site, as well as a freelancer writing for other magazines and newspapers. He also writes programme notes and blogs on Substack. Mark has a particular passion for the operas of Verdi as well as Russian and French repertoire. Outside the concert hall and opera house, Mark enjoys cooking and travel and is probably at his happiest let loose in a French patisserie or a Viennese coffee house.