
Richard Sasanow
Theatre Journalist Richard Sasanow has written 709 articles for BroadwayWorld since 2013, covering Opera Theatre.
Richard Sasanow has been BroadwayWorld.com's Opera Editor for many years, with interests covering contemporary works, standard repertoire and true rarities from every era. He is an interviewer of important musical figures on the current scene--from singers Diana Damrau, Peter Mattei, Stephanie Blythe, Davone Tines, Nadine Sierra, Angela Meade, Isabel Leonard, Lawrence Brownlee, Etienne Dupuis, Javier Camarena and Christian Van Horn to Pulitzer Prize-winning composers Kevin Puts and Paul Moravec, and icon Thea Musgrave, composers David T. Little, Julian Grant, Ricky Ian Gordon, Laura Kaminsky and Iain Bell, librettists Mark Campbell, Kim Reed, Royce Vavrek and Nicholas Wright, to conductor Manfred Honeck, director Kevin Newbury and Tony-winning designer Christine Jones. Earlier in his career, he interviewed such great singers as Birgit Nilsson, and Martina Arroyo and worked on the first US visit of the Vienna State Opera, with Karl Bohm, Zubin Mehta and Leonard Bernstein, and the inaugural US tour of the Orchestre National de France, with Bernstein and Lorin Maazel. Sasanow is also a long-time writer on art, music, food, travel and international business for publications including The New York Times, The Guardian, Town & Country and Travel & Leisure, among many others.
Most Popular Articles


Review: Rome Opera’s New FALSTAFF under Mariotti Shows Off Gleaming Cast, Lackluster Production
October 17, 2026

Review: “Oh, QUEENEY!” It’s Bottoms Up for Heartbeat Opera’s Drag Extravaganza
October 25, 2026

Review: Warhorses? Hi Yo, Silver, With Sierra, Grigorian, Radvanovsky, Jagde at Carnegie Hall
December 29, 2025

Review: Davidsen, an ISOLDE for the Ages, Alongside Spyres' Splendid TRISTAN in Wagner at the Met
March 10, 2026

Review: Despite Stellar Cast, Met's ONEGIN Revival Refuses to Fly in Warner’s Misbegotten Production
April 21, 2026
Latest Articles

Review: “Oh, QUEENEY!” It’s Bottoms Up for Heartbeat Opera’s Drag Extravaganza
October 25, 2026
When Stephen Sondheim was asked whether SWEENEY TODD was a musical or an opera, he answered that it depended where it was being done—a theatre or an opera house.

Review: Mazzoli/Vavrek LINCOLN Is Alive and Well at Met World Premiere under Nezet-Seguin
October 20, 2026
LINCOLN IN THE BARDO, the world premiere work by Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek, came to the Met last night in a stunning production—and not a moment too soon.

Review: Rome Opera’s New FALSTAFF under Mariotti Shows Off Gleaming Cast, Lackluster Production
October 17, 2026
I wonder what Arrigo Boito might have done with Shakespeare’s “A Comedy of Errors” or “Twelfth Night.

Review: Making Scotland Great Again with Thrilling Davidsen and Kelsey in Met’s New MACBETH
September 23, 2026
There’s not an ounce of humanity in any of the three principals at the core of Verdi’s MACBETH, in a new production by Louisa Proske in her Met debut, which opened the company’s new season Tuesday night.

Review: Klaus Nomi - Still Hovering Somewhere Between the Opera House and Outer Space
September 2, 2026
Klaus Nomi—born Klaus Sperber in Germany in 1944—was an otherworldly countertenor who materialized on New York’s downtown scene in the late 1970s.

Review: Lise Davidsen’s Strauss LAST SONGS is First in Anyone’s Book, with Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra
August 28, 2026
While it was only one part of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra’s concert, under Keri-Lyn Wilson, at Geffen Hall the other night, there’s no denying that the centerpiece was Richard Strauss’s FOUR LAST SONGS with the brilliant soprano Lise Davidsen—one of the Met’s star attractions these day

REVIEW: Impressive Singing in Strauss’s EGYPTIAN HELEN, but the Story’s a Mystery at SummerScape
August 2, 2026
If you ever wondered about the private life of the legendary Helen of Troy—aside from being a fabulous beauty whose face reputedly launched a thousand ships—you might look for answers in Richard Strauss’s opera DIE AEGIPTISCHE HELENA (THE EGYPTIAN HELEN).

Review: DON GIOVANNI a Bel Canto Opera? Crutchfield’s Teatro Nuovo Proves It
July 19, 2026
To “IL” or not to “IL”—that is the question.

Review: Teatro Nuovo Does It Again with Smashing TURCO IN ITALIA
July 16, 2026
While the US celebrates its 250th anniversary (with not much to cheer about), those bel canto specialists under Will Crutchfield at Teatro Nuovo are reveling in the 200th year since Italian opera (or at least opera in Italian) came to this country.

Review: TURANDOT Returns for Another Go-Around at the Met in Classic Zeffirelli Production
May 24, 2026
I’d say that “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is not a maxim that has ever been used for Puccini’s Chinese-inspired fairytale, TURANDOT, which returned for another go-around at the Met the other day with two alternating casts.

Interview: Atlanta Opera’s Tomer Zvulun on Wagner’s TWILIGHT OF THE GODS, the Finale of His RING Cycle
May 21, 2026
“Stories are stories are stories, whether it’s Wagner’s Wotan and Fricka (in the Ring), Handel’s Jupiter and Juno (in Handel’s SEMELE) or Broadway’s Tevye and Golde (FIDDLER ON THE ROOF) and they repeat in different cultures and traditions,” General Manager and Artistic Director of the

Review: Barber’s VANESSA – or Is It ERIKA? – Returns with Heartbeat Opera
May 19, 2026
I caught up with Heartbeat Opera’s reinvention of Samuel Barber’s 1958 opera, VANESSA, to Giancarlo Menotti’s libretto, a few days after its debut at the Baruch Performing Arts Center in New York, after premiering last summer at the Williamstown (MA) Theatre Festival.

Review: FRIDA Y DIEGO is the Ultimate Dream in Its Met Premiere
May 15, 2026
The story of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera—two great Mexican artists who also happened to be in a tempestuous marriage—seems tailor-made for the opera stage.

Review: TRAVIATA May Not Be in Opera’s ABCs But Jaho Gives Lesson in Making It Her Own
May 8, 2026
Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho wasn’t the first Violetta of this season’s LA TRAVIATA by Verdi at the Met.

Review: FALSTAFF Shows that We Can Count on Juilliard for the Next Generation of Singers
April 28, 2026
In case we had to be reminded—after the Met’s recent Laffont Competition lineup, where three Juilliard singers were among the finalists—the Juilliard School is among the top sources of the next generation of opera singers (among many other categories, of course).

Review: Hannigan is a ‘Double Threat’ - Singing/Conducting LA VOIX HUMAINE at the NY Philharmonic
April 25, 2026
There was a time early in this century when conductor Lorin Maazel led Massenet’s opera THAIS, surprising audiences by picking up a violin during Act II to play the work’s famous “Meditation” himself—usually the realm of the concertmaster.

Review: Despite Stellar Cast, Met's ONEGIN Revival Refuses to Fly in Warner’s Misbegotten Production
April 21, 2026
In the Met’s much-anticipated revival of Tchaikovsky’s EUGENE ONEGIN, almost anything that could go wrong, in fact, did, at Monday night’s premiere.

Review: Kaija Saariaho’s INNOCENCE – An Opera About a Killing Spree – Doesn’t Let Up in Met Premiere
April 7, 2026
I noticed that the Simon Stone production of Kaija Saariaho’s INNOCENCE, which had its local premiere last night at the Met, was a co-commission and -production of five other opera companies.

Review: World Premiere of Lang’s NATIONS Brings Wealth of Music to NY Philharmonic under Dudamel
March 23, 2026
Composer David Lang’s THE WEALTH OF NATIONS had a splendid world premiere this week at the New York Philharmonic under Artistic Director Designate Gustavo Dudamel, with mezzo Fleur Barron, bass-baritone Davone Tines and the Philharmonic’s chorus (under Malcolm Merriweather).

Review: Handel’s Unfamiliar but Fine HERCULES with The English Concert and Bicket, at Carnegie Hall
March 17, 2026
If you’re thinking of the muscle-bound hero of action films—or even Disney animation—boy, have you got the wrong HERCULES.
BroadwayWorld TV