The Children’s Hour: an eclectic and enlightening new disc from baritone Gareth Brynmor John

Between the dark and the daylight,      When the night is beginning to lower,Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,      That is known as the Children’s Hour. The nineteenth-century poet Henry…

Tête à Tête, The Opera Festival: How to successfully put on live performances during a pandemic

Ahead of its 2021 return, Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival has released a video and other assets with key tips on how to successfully put on live performances in the new age of pandemic. The short…

Date announced for International Opera Awards 2021

2020 winners to be revealed in virtual event on Monday May 10Exclusive performances from stars of the opera worldEvent will raise funds for Artist Hardship Fund#OperaAwards2021 The International Opera Awards…

English National Opera and BBC Two announce the broadcast of Handel’s Messiah, captured exclusively for television this Easter

English National Opera (ENO) and BBC Two today announce that a specially-created concert of Handel’s Messiah will be recorded for exclusive broadcast on BBC Two this Easter.  The hour-long performance of Handel’s…

Alastair White’s ROBE: a ‘fashion-opera’

If Rousseau, Marx, Einstein, Lacan and Bill Gates were to collaborate on an opera, what would they create?  Perhaps something not unlike ROBE by the Scottish composer and writer Alastair…

Visions of Childhood: April Fredrick and the English Symphony Orchestra

“Let’s not lose our wayin this solitude.” (‘September’, from Vier Letzte Lieder) The last work that American-born, UK-domiciled soprano April Fredrick performed before the March 2020 coronavirus lockdown was Richard…

W11 Opera announces exclusive screening of its 2020 online production, JUKEBOX

In 2020 when all the theatres across the UK were forced to close their doors, one children’s Opera company decided there was only one option: the show must go on…

20 Shots of Opera: Irish National Opera administer a creative ‘cure’

shot [noun]: an attempt to do or achieve something that you have not done before; an attempt to do or achieve something that is difficult, when success is uncertain; a…

ENO appoints Lord Chris Smith to Board of Trustees

English National Opera (ENO) is pleased to announce that Lord Chris Smith is joining the ENO Board of Trustees with immediate effect. From 1997 to 2001 Lord Smith was Secretary…

Remembering Anne Ozorio, 1951–2020

“I’m a large Asian-American, and I’ll wear something bright. You won’t miss me!” Anne’s response when I asked how I might recognise her when we first met, at an evening…