Recently in Commentary

ETO Autumn 2020 Season Announcement: Lyric Solitude

English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.

Eight Songs from Isolation: first opera written for a socially distanced world

Conductor Oliver Zeffman has commissioned the very first opera for a socially distanced world, which is now available to watch exclusively on Apple Music. Eight Songs From Isolation has been written by eight leading composers, specifically for streaming - rather than live performance - and is the first opera written for a time when the performers were unable to meet in person.

Let Music Live

Leading freelance musicians unite in Parliament Square to call for targeted support for colleagues in the arts and entertainment sector.

Murphy & Attridge celebrate performers' humanity with a creative response to lockdown

Duo Lewis Murphy (composer) and Laura Attridge (writer) have launched a charitable song project entitled Notes From Isolation. The resulting songs, featuring some of the UK's top singing talent, are being released online between August and October 2020 and can be enjoyed free of charge.

The Royal Opera House unveils programme of new work alongside much-loved classics for live audiences this Autumn

The Royal Opera House is thrilled to announce an exciting, wide-ranging new line-up for its autumn programme. For the first time, extraordinary performances will be accessible online for a global audience through livestreams and for socially distanced live audiences at our home in Covent Garden. In a global first, we present a new opera in hyper-reality, alongside repertory favourites from both artistic companies.

Wexford Festival Opera Gala Concert - Remote Voices: as part of Waiting for Shakespeare …The Festival in the air

Some of the most famous and outstanding stars from the opera world are to take part in a very special evening from Wexford Festival Opera, including Aigul Akhmetshina, Joseph Calleja, Daniela Barcellona, Juan Diego Flórez, Igor Golovatenko, Ermonela Jaho, Sergey Romanovsky, and many more.

OperaStreaming announces second season of nine new productions from the opera houses of Emilia-Romagna, free to view on YouTube

Following its successful launch in 2019, OperaStreaming streams nine operas on YouTube from the historic opera houses of Emilia-Romagna during the 2020-21 season, with fully-staged productions of Verdi's La traviata in October from Modena and Verdi'sOtello from Bologna in...

Connections Across Time: Sholto Kynoch on the 2020 Oxford Lieder Festival

‘A brief history of song’ is the subtitle of the 2020 Oxford Lieder Festival (10th-17th October), which will present an ambitious, diverse and imaginative programme of 40 performances and events.

Bampton Classical Opera 2020: Gluck's The Crown at St John's Smith Square

Bampton Classical Opera returns to the Baroque splendour of London’s St John’s Smith Square on November 6 with a concert performance of Gluck’s one-act opera The Crown, the first in the UK since 1987. The performance will also be filmed and available to watch on demand on the Bampton website from 9 November.

A new opera written during lockdown with three different endings to choose from to premiere this October as part of Wexford Festival Opera

While many of us spent lockdown at home taking it a little easier, composer Andrew Synnott wrote an opera.

Grange Park Opera presents Britten’s Owen Wingrave, filmed on location in haunted houses in Surrey and London

Owen Wingrave is part of the new Interim Season of 19 brand new events, all free to view online between September and December 2020.

Music and Theatre For All launches three major new projects supported by The Arts Council

The Arts Council has awarded innovative UK charity Music and Theatre For All (MTFA) a major new grant to develop three ambitious new projects in the wake of Covid 19.

English National Opera to reopen the London Coliseum with performances of Mozart’s Requiem

English National Opera (ENO) will reopen the London Coliseum to socially distanced audiences on 6 and 7 November for special performances of Mozart’s Requiem. These will provide audiences with an opportunity to reflect upon and to commemorate the difficulties the nation has faced during the pandemic.

The Royal Opera House launches autumn digital programme with a new series of Friday Premieres and screenings on Sky Arts

The Royal Opera House is proud to continue its curated #OurHouseToYourHouse programme into the autumn, bringing audiences the best of the ROH through a new series of Friday Premieres and cultural highlights.

Take a Bow: Royal Opera House opens its doors for the first time in six months as part of Open House London

After six months of closure, the Royal Opera House is thrilled to be opening its doors to the public as part of Open House London weekend, giving visitors a taste of one of the world’s most famous theatres for free.

Academy of St Martin in the Fields presents re:connect - a series of autumn concerts at St. Martin-in-the-Fields

The Academy of St Martin in the Fields is thrilled to announce re:connect - an eight concert series with live socially distanced audiences at its namesake church, St. Martin-in-the-Fields. The autumn concerts will take place at 5pm & 7:30pm on two Saturdays per month with guest artists including baritone Roderick Williams, soprano Carolyn Sampson and composer-conductor-pianist Ryan Wigglesworth performing a wide range of repertoire.

Connections Across Time: The Oxford Lieder Festival, 10-17 October 2020

Music and poetry unite and collide across centuries, from the Medieval to the Enlightenment to the present day. This year, the Oxford Lieder Festival will present a thrilling and innovative programme comprising more than forty events streamed over eight days.

The English Concert Autumn 2020 series: Handel and Purcell, Britain’s Orpheus

The English Concert with artistic director Harry Bicket is delighted to announce a series of concerts from 1-15 October 2020. The concerts take place in historic London venues with star soloists and will be performed and streamed live to a paying audience at 7pm GMT on each performance date. The programmes include first-class vocal and instrumental works from the two pillars of the English Baroque, covering different aspects of the repertoire.

Glyndebourne announces first indoor performances since lockdown, and unveils 2021 Festival repertoire

Glyndebourne has announced plans for a ‘staycation’ series of socially-distanced indoor performances, starting on 10 October 2020.

Royal Opera House announces autumn opera and ballet concerts

The Royal Opera House is delighted to announce two packed evenings of opera and ballet, live from our stage in Covent Garden and available to view wherever you are in the world online.

OPERA TODAY ARCHIVES »

Commentary

31 Jul 2020

Opera Holland Park returns for a series of outdoor performances this summer

Opera Holland Park (OHP) will present a series of outdoor performances this summer in the space where the theatre normally stands. The company held its first concert since lockdown this weekend. The performance sold out in less than 90...

Opera Holland Park (OHP) will present a series of outdoor performances this summer in the space where the theatre normally stands. The company held its first concert since lockdown this weekend. The performance sold out in less than 90 minutes.

Further concerts include an evening of light music and operetta on 7 August, an evening of great operatic arias on 8 August, and a reduced and relaxed performance of The Pirates of Penzance on 2 August for families. Tickets for the remaining concerts go on sale to the public on Wednesday 29 July at 1pm. Priority booking is also available for OHP Members and Supporters.

Opera Holland Park is thrilled to be returning to Holland Park this summer for a limited series of outdoor performances. More information about these performances can be found below.

Heart’s Delight: An evening of light music and operetta, Friday 7 August, 6pm

Last seen at Opera Holland Park conducting Wolf-Ferrari’s romantic comedy, Il segreto di Susanna, John Andrews has devised a journey through some of the most delicious comic operas from the Viennese, Parisian and London stages. Birdcatchers, gendarmes, lovers and policemen dance in and out of music by Mozart, Offenbach, Sullivan, Strauss and Lehár. Featuring Yvonne Howard, John Savournin, Fflur Wyn, Robert Murray and Alison Langer, with an ensemble of strings and woodwind from City of London Sinfonia, the programme is the perfect apéritif for a summer’s evening at Holland Park. For more information visit https://operahollandpark.com/events/hearts-delight/ .

Opera Holland Park In Concert: The Encore, Saturday 8 August, 6pm

Following the company’s homecoming concert on 25 July and to mark what would have been the closing night of the 2020 summer season, OHP is delighted to announce a further evening of great operatic arias on 8 August. This performance will feature singers including Natalya Romaniw, Jennifer France, Alison Langer, Nardus Williams, Ross Ramgobin, Anush Hovhannisyan, Aigul Akhmetshina, Samuel Sakker, Anna Patalong, Emma Stannard and Grant Doyle. Matthew Kofi Waldren returns to conduct an ensemble drawn from resident orchestra, City of London Sinfonia. For more information visit https://operahollandpark.com/events/opera-holland-park-in-concert-the-encore/.

The Pirates’ Return, Sunday 2 August, 4pm

On Sunday 2 August the company’s award-winning education and outreach team, Inspire, will present a reduced and relaxed performance of Gilbert and Sullivan’s very model of British comic opera, The Pirates of Penzance, for families. This performance is a revival of a family production put together for Pirates to Penzance, an Inspire project which saw the cast travel from London to Penzance, performing to schools and care homes along the way. Revived by Rosie Purdie, with Stuart Wild as musical director, the homecoming cast includes Maciek O’Shea, Daisy Brown, Peter Martin, Alistair Sutherland, Lotte Betts-Dean, Matthew Kellett, Henry Grant Kerswell, Hannah Boxall and Sophie Dicks. More information: https://operahollandpark.com/events/the-pirates-return/.

All performances will adhere to latest guidance from Public Health England. In accordance with the current guidelines on social distancing and outdoor performances, and in consultation with RBKC, the seating capacity for all performances is strictly limited to 200. Performances are completely open air, and will continue in rain or shine.

Send to a friend

Send a link to this article to a friend with an optional message.

Friend's Email Address: (required)

Your Email Address: (required)

Message (optional):