Year: 2018

Frank Castorf might have been born to direct From the House of the Dead. In this, his third opera project – or better, his third opera project in the opera house, for his Volksb¸hne Meistersinger must surely be reckoned with, even by those of us who did not see it – many of his hallmarks and those of his team are present, yet without the slightest hint of staleness, of anything other than being reborn for and in the work.

Should you not like eighteenth-century opera very much, if at all, and should you have no or little interest in Haydn either, this may have been the production for you. The fundamental premise of Axel Ranisch’s staging of Orlando Paladino seems to have been that this was a work of little fundamental merit, or at least a work in a genre of little such merit, and that it needed the help of a modern medium – perhaps, it might even be claimed, an equivalent medium – to speak to a contemporary audience.

‘The score … is precisely one of those works that neither the composer nor the public takes seriously. The harmony, melody, rhythmic effects, instrumental and vocal combinations; it’s music, if you wish, but not new music. The orchestra consumes itself in useless noises…’

Santa Fe Opera’s Candide is a nearly indefatigable romp that is currently parading on the Crosby Theatre stage, chockfull of inventive ideas.

Two new stars moved triumphantly into the ongoing run of Santa Fe Opera’s mesmerizing rendition of Puccini’s Madame Butterfly.

For Prom 17, Martyn Brabbins, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and the BBC National Chorus of Wales brought together English music written either side of the First World War.

Fascinating programming from the BBC Philharmonic under their Finnish Chief Guest Conductor, John StorgÂrds. The mix of vocal music, arrangements and multiple pieces per half felt like a flashback to the early days of the Proms, offering eclectic mixes of vocal and instrumental soloists.