(© Glyndebourne Productions Ltd. Photo: Tristram Kenton) Lash your picnic baskets to the deck: Benjamin Britten’s “Billy Budd” — the tangled morality tale of innocence and cruelty aboard a Napoleonic-era Man-of-War with words by E.M. Forster and Eric Crozier — has set sail once again at the Glyndebourne Festival. Michael Grandage’s production from 2010 was the company’s first staging of {…}
B:Music has released the details of its 2025-26 Birmingham Classical season. The article only features vocal performances. Lunchtime Organ Concerts with Thomas Trotter features guests such as the Lichfield Cathedral Choir, Hereford Cathedral Choir, and the Gloucester Cathedral Choir, among others. Performance Dates: December 8 & 15, 2025 & March 23, 2026 ECHO Rising Star soprano Álfheiður Erla Guðmundsdóttir performs {…}
(Photo: © Glyndebourne Productions Ltd. Photography by Richard Hubert Smith) “Carmen” is unquestionably one of the most popular works ever composed and has become an almost permanent fixture in the repertoire of opera houses. However, this presents something of a dilemma for those creative artists and directors who desire to produce the opera in a more contemporary setting and feel {…}
(Photo: © Richard Hubert Smith/Glyndebourne Festival Opera 2024) The picnic hampers are packed, dinner jackets dry-cleaned, cufflinks wrangled, and drizzle forecast: the British country house opera season is back. It opens with a new production of Georges Bizet’s box-office stalwart “Carmen” from Glyndebourne Festival Opera, directed by Diane Paulus and conducted by Glyndebourne Music Director Robin Ticciati. This latest version, {…}
Photo: © Glyndebourne Productions Ltd. Photo: Tristram Kenton Normally, ‘heritage’ productions make me nervous. The established stagings summon to mind lumbering Zeffirelli-esque spectacles and unwieldy, moth-eaten costumes. Opera houses resting on their artistic laurels, unwilling take artistic risks. The ingrained conservatism in the opera business that could even prove fatal for the art form. But, Peter Hall’s production of Benjamin {…}
The Scottish Opera has announced its 2023-24 season. Opera Samuel Dale Johnson, Simone McIntosh, Anthony Gregory, David Stout, and Dingle Yandell star in Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville.” Stuart Stratford conducts the production by Sir Thomas Allen. Performance Dates: Oct. 17-Nov. 25, 2023 Jonathan Dive’s “Marx in London” will be conducted by David Parry and directed by Stephen Barlow. The {…}
Nevill Holt Opera has announced the creative teams, principal cast, and orchestra partners for its outdoor summer festival kicking off on Aug. 4, 2021. The company will present two operas, Verdi’s “La Traviata,” and Mozart’s “Don Giovanni,” on an outdoor stage built to frame the stunning valley views from Nevill Holt. The new outdoor space will accommodate 650 people in {…}
(Credit: Zen Grisdale) The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (OAE) is actively creating new life in the digital realm of opera by evolving the genre’s traditional standards and exploring alternate creative interpretations to share with audience members at a broader level through a new series called “music video remake” films. The aesthetic concept underlying OAE’s recent film which features bass-baritone {…}
(Credits: © Dario Acosta / © Gregor Hohenberg / Sony Classical / © Gregor Hohenberg / Sony Music Entertainment / © Tatiana Vlasova / © Dario Acosta) The Wiener Konzerthaus has announced its 2021-22 season featuring a variety of concerts from some of the world’s greatest performers. For the purpose of this article, we will only focus on the vocal {…}
(Credits: Linda Rabisch / Bethany Davis / Gerard Collett) The Glyndebourne Festival has announced its fall tour 2021 that will take place from October 8 – Dec. 12, 2021. Here is the full slate. Ludwig van Beethoven‘s only opera “Fidelio” will star Clay Hilley as Don Florestan, Callum Thorpe in the role of Rocco, Carrie-Ann Williams as Marzelline, Gavan Ring {…}
