Opera Theater Reviews

Review: NABUCCO, Verdi's First Big Hit, Returns to the Met with a Terrifying Monastyrska under Callegari's Baton
by Richard Sasanow - October 02, 2023

The Met’s production of NABUCCO from Elijah Moshinsky may date back to 2001 but its style hearkens back even further--a fancy, old-fashioned unit set that uses the house’s big turntable--and it’s a whale of a show, design-wise, thanks to John Napier’s scenic design....

Review: With a Different Perspective, UNHOLY WARS Shows What's Old is New Again at Opera Philadelphia
by Richard Sasanow - September 28, 2023

According to creator and star tenor Karim Sulayman, UNHOLY WARS, a 70-minute opera pastiche that made its debut on Saturday at Philadelphia Opera’s O23 Festival, “stitches together a collection of baroque music centered around the Middle East and the Crusades, examining the separation of the human r...

Review: PICTURE A DAY LIKE THIS, Royal Opera House
by Alexander Cohen - September 28, 2023

George Benjamin's slick new opera plays at the Royal Opera House after a critically acclaimed run at Festival d'Aix-en-Provence...

Review: Met Audience Entranced by DiDonato and McKinny in Heggie-McNally DEAD MAN in House Debut
by Richard Sasanow - September 27, 2023

It’s rather surprising, really, for the audience to embrace a contemporary piece like DEAD MAN WALKING, no matter how easily it falls upon the ears, considering the subject matter. In this Ivo van Hove production, it starts with a rape and double murder in a rather graphic piece of film, the use of ...

Review: Orth-Moscovitch Stunning MADHOUSE Tells of Women Past the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown at Opera Philadelphia Festival O23
by Richard Sasanow - September 27, 2023

When composer Rene Orth came across the story of investigative reporter Nellie Bly’s expose of the abuse of women at an asylum in New York at the end of the 19th century, she immediately knew that “this story needed to be told as an opera.” She was right. The result of her efforts, with the first-r...

Review: Jonas Kaufmann Returns to New York in 'Anxious and Heavy' DOPPELGANGER
by Richard Sasanow - September 25, 2023

Another year, another Met season without Jonas Kaufmann. Sigh. What’s a music lover to do? His current set of performances is at the Park Avenue Armory’s Drill Hall--in a staged production by Claud Guth, commissioned by the Armory, of Schubert lieder, under the title DOPPELGANGER, an evening of autu...

Review: L'ELISIR D'AMORE, Royal Opera House
by Gary Naylor - September 24, 2023

Liparit Avetsiyan lends emotional weight to an opera that veers a little too close to pantomime on occasion...

Review: PETER GRIMES, London Coliseum
by Alexander Cohen - September 22, 2023

Deftly balances psychological thrill with morality as murky as the North Sea...

Review: LA FORZA DEL DESTINO, Royal Opera House
by Gary Naylor - September 20, 2023

Sondra Radvanovsky, Brian Jagde and Etienne Dupuis lead a wonderful cast and orchestra in a near-overwhelming production that fully justifies its four hours running time...

Review: THE MIKADO, Grimeborn, Arcola Theatre
by Michael Higgs - September 20, 2023

It maintains the opera’s timeless charm, strong wit, and with a cast that never takes itself seriously, leads to an evening that has the audience roaring with laughter....

Review: Lise Davidsen's Recital at the Met will be a Hard Act for a DEAD MAN to Follow
by Richard Sasanow - September 17, 2023

The Metropolitan Opera somehow managed to upstage itself on Thursday, when it offered audiences a spectacular recital by Norwegian soprano Lisa Davidsen, with her excellent musical partner James Baillieu, on piano, 12 days before the company’s official opening night (the Jake Heggie-Terrence McNally...

Review: Cape Town Opera's TOSCA is Lush and Transportive
by Klara van Rooyen - September 17, 2023

What did our critic think of TOSCA at Cape Town Opera?...

Review: DAS RHEINGOLD, Royal Opera House
by Alexander Cohen - September 12, 2023

Given his political radicalism and fervent romanticism, it is more than fair to wonder if Richard Wagner would be partial to Just Stop Oil. Sporting his iconic beret, would he, if he were around today, brandish banners and block cars on the M1? Barrie Kosky may think so. He thrusts Wagner’s ecologic...

Review: TURANDOT, Grimeborn Festival, Arcola Theatre
by Gary Naylor - August 26, 2023

The thrill of operatic voices singing up close and personal in a radical re-interpretation of an opera ripe for bringing into the 21st century...

Review: DAS RHEINGOLD at McCaw Hall
by Erica Miner - August 13, 2023

The outstanding cast and provocative production, merged with Wagner’s indisputably monumental music and drama, made this Rheingold a de rigueur happening...

Review: LOYOLA, Grimeborn Festival, Arcola Theatre
by Gary Naylor - August 12, 2023

Beautifully sung South American opera flawed a little by its overpowering religious messaging....

Review: TROUBLE IN TAHITI, Grimeborn Festival, Arcola Theatre
by Gary Naylor - August 11, 2023

Boutique opera now 72 years old but could have been written yesterday in terms of its music, its themes and its relevance, performed with verve and confidence...

Review: RUDDIGORE, Opera Holland Park
by Gary Naylor - August 10, 2023

Super show, a little slow at first, but blossoming into an escapist entertainment that can be enjoyed as much in the 2020s as it was in the 1880s...

Review: In Saint-Saens' HENRI VIII, the King Has the Title but the Queens Are in Charge at Bard Festival
by Richard Sasanow - July 30, 2023

Donizetti’s so-called “Tudor Trilogy”--ANNA BOLENA, MARIA STUARDA and ROBERTO DEVEREUX (aka, “the one about Elizabeth I”)--suddenly has some competition on British history in opera: Camille Saint-Saens' HENRI VIII....

Review: NO FOR AN ANSWER, Grimeborn, Arcola Theatre
by Michael Higgs - July 28, 2023

A strong score, neat production by Mehmet Ergen and an excellent cast make it worth a watch, even if it has several plot-related issues...

Review: ITCH, Opera Holland Park
by Gary Naylor - July 27, 2023

Jonathan Dove's music underpins and enhances the tale of a teen suddenly thrust into a world of corporate power and environmental exploitation...

Review: Crutchfield's Teatro Nuovo Turns Fairy Godmother as CRISPINO Returns to New York
by Richard Sasanow - July 23, 2023

The famed playwright and wit George S. Kaufman once said, “Satire is what closes on Saturday night.” One can only imagine what Kaufman--whose many credits include YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU, as well as the source of Sondheim’s MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG, which is circling Broadway for a return this fall-...

Review: PROM 11: HORRIBLE HISTORIES - 'ORRIBLE OPERA, Royal Albert Hall
by Kat Mokrynski - July 24, 2023

Prom 11: Horrible Histories ‘Orrible Opera is a delightful show that will amuse audiences of all ages while making opera more approachable....

Review: Splendid Donizetti Rarity POLIUTO Showed Its Great Bones via Crutchfield's Teatro Nuovo
by Richard Sasanow - July 20, 2023

Usually, when long-neglected works somehow find their way to the forefront, we find there’s a pretty good reason for the lack of interest. Happily for us, this does not apply to Donizetti’s POLIUTO, which Will Crutchfield’s Teatro Nuovo performed last weekend at Montclair State’s Kasser Theatre and ...

Review: THE TURN OF THE SCREW at Union Avenue Opera
by Benjamin Torbert - July 10, 2023

“The Turn of the Screw,” a deft psychological exploration of the dimensions of horror and the human mind. UAO’s successful staging of the work appropriately raised more questions than it answered, about danger, fear, the limits of human perception, and a host of other commonplaces in horror....