Seductively morbid – The Fall of the House of Usher in The Hague

What does it feel like to be depressed? “It’s like water seeping into my heart” is how one young sufferer put it.

Daring Pairing Doubles the Fun by Pacific Opera Project

Puccini’s only comedy, the one act Gianni Schicchi is most often programmed with a second short piece of tragic fare, but the adventurous Pacific Opera Project has banked on a fanciful Ravel opus to sustain the mood and send the audience home with tickled ribs and gladdened hearts.

Bieito’s Carmen returns to English National Opera

‘Men Behaving Badly’ wouldn’t be a bad subtitle for Calixto Bieito’s production of Carmen, currently being revived at ENO.

Coquettes, Wives, and Widows: Gender Politics in French Baroque Opera and Theater

A revelatory study of how composers and dramatists of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century France criticized and trivialized independent women in their portrayals of them in works of theater and opera.

Twilight People: Andreas Scholl and Tamar Halperin at Wigmore Hall

Twilight people: existing betwixt and between states, slipping the bounds of categorisation, on the edge of the norm.

A French Affair: La Nuova Musica at Wigmore Hall

A French Affair, as this programme was called, was a promising concept on paper, but despite handsomely sung contributions from the featured soloists and much energetic direction from David Bates, it never quite translated into a wholly satisfying evening’s performance.

Eugene Onegin at Seattle

Passion! Pain! Poetry! (but hold the irony . . .)

Unusual and beautiful: Mirga Graûinyt?-Tyla conducts the music of Raminta äerkönyt?

Mirga Graûinyt?-Tyla conducts the music of Raminta äerkönyt? with the Kremerata Baltica, in this new release from Deutsche Grammophon.

Pow! Zap! Zowie! Wowie! -or- Arthur, King of Long Beach

If you might have thought a late 17thcentury semi-opera about a somewhat precious fairy tale monarch might not be your cup of twee, Long Beach Opera cogently challenges you to think again.

Philippe Jaroussky and JÈrÙme Ducros perform Schubert at Wigmore Hall

How do you like your Schubert? Let me count the ways …