Review: THE BARBER OF SEVILLE BY ROSSINI at San Diego Civic Center Theater
by Ron Bierman - February 20, 2026
Rossini’s Barber of Seville is a top ten opera in performances. Donors love it for its vocal gymnastics, memorable arias and sparkling melodies. Receptive newcomers like it because of its delightful bubbling overture, the familiar Figaro aria that soon follows, and its simple fast-moving sitcom-li...
Review: COSÌ FAN TUTTE, London Coliseum
by Franco Milazzo - February 07, 2026
Phelim McDermott directing Così fan tutte is a bit like asking a Catholic priest to do Mass in full drag. You know something deliciously outrageous is going to happen. You also know, whether people will like it or not, that it might be exactly what this masterpiece out of step with modern attitudes...
Review: BORIS GUDUNOV, Royal Ballet And Opera
by Franco Milazzo - January 30, 2026
If Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov were a dinner party, Richard Jones’s Russian-language revival at the Royal Opera House would be the dinner date where you arrive bright and curious and leave questioning your life choices, nursing a neat whisky in a corner. This is not an opera that gives up its sec...
Review: HMS Pinafore, London Coliseum
by Michael Higgs - January 24, 2026
A revival of Cal McCrystal’s 2021 production, HMS Pinafore at the London Coliseum charms with wit, a stunning cast, and gorgeous Victorian designs....
Review: Cleveland Orchestra’s Splendid VERDI REQUIEM at Carnegie Hall
by Richard Sasanow - January 22, 2026
The Verdi Messa da Requiem—better known to English speakers as the Verdi Requiem—featuring the Cleveland Orchestra and its Chorus, with a quartet of soloists, breezed into Carnegie Hall the other night and promptly knocked many concert-goers out of their seats....
Review: DAPHNE IN CONCERT at McCaw Hall
by Erica Miner - January 20, 2026
Daphne in Concert, Seattle Opera’s latest offering in their series of concert presentations initiated in 2023, proved that the series concept is a successful one....
Review: CARMEN Sizzles with Akhmetshina Heading Stellar Cast at the Met
by Richard Sasanow - January 16, 2026
From her first appearance on stage, it was clear that mezzo Aigul Akhmetshina was no flash in the pan when she gave us a scorching Carmen when this production was new just two years ago. The program describes the title character as “a force of nature” and that’s certainly what we got at the Me...