Offenbach: The Tales of Hoffmann (Komische Oper Berlin)

After over a century out of the Met’s repertoire, audiences were thrilled to discover just what a sensational evening in the theater Thomas’s Hamlet can be. Simon Keenlyside’s riveting performance as the tortured Prince of Denmark in Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser’s starkly brooding production had critics raving that Keenlyside’s superb singing, coupled with his deftly delineated three-dimensional Hamlet, was one of the greatest examples of operatic drama of our time. The cast includes Marlis Petersen as the long suffering Ophélie, who brilliantly shows why her mad scene is so justly famous, along with Jennifer Larmore and James Morris as Gertrude and Claudius.

Verdi’s grand opera “Aida” is given an intimate treatment in Busetto, Italy, in 2001, in a staging with young singers, all coached by the legendary tenor Carlo Bergonzi and staged by Franco Zeffirelli. The result is an astonishing musical and dramatic piece of theater, proving that with the right mix of ingredients, an opera can be staged in a small theater and still achieve a thrilling and moving effect.

Live performance at Opernhaus Zürich in 2006. Nello Santi conducting Orchester der Oper Zürich and Chor der Oper Zürich. Directed for the stage by Gilbert Deflo.

An impoverished knight is at odds with his rich but miserly father

Lucia di Lammermoor, dramma tragico in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti (1797 - 1848). Libretto by Salvadore Cammarano, after Walter Scott's 'The Bride of Lammermoor'. First performance in Naples, Teatro San Carlo, 26 September 1835 Recording: December 23 2015 - Gran Teatre del Liceu | Barcelona Director: Fabrice Castanier Conductor: Marco Armiliato Orchestra & Chorus of the Gran Teatre del Liceu

"Yenufa" is an outstanding phenomenon in the music of the 20th century. Drawing on Moravian folklore, Janáček faithfully and deeply conveyed the drama of a peasant girl. The composer followed the path of Mussorgsky, revealing the spiritual life of people through the recreation of intonations of living speech. The libretto is based on a drama written in a naturalistic manner. Free from naturalism, Janáček's music has powerful emotional strength and psychological truth. It was written during a difficult period in the composer's life (illness and death of his daughter).

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is a remarkably talented young Viennese composer who unwittingly finds a fierce rival in the disciplined and determined Antonio Salieri. Resenting Mozart for both his hedonistic lifestyle and his undeniable talent, the highly religious Salieri is gradually consumed by his jealousy and becomes obsessed with Mozart's downfall, leading to a devious scheme that has dire consequences for both men.

Naši furianti

Part of the celebrations for the 150th anniversary of the death of the Pesaro composer, Il Barbiere di Siviglia staged in Lugano, is the result of a virtuous collaboration that involved Swiss Radio and Television, LuganoInScena and LuganoMusica. The musical part was entrusted to Maestro Diego Fasolis who, together with his Barocchisti ensemble, was involved in the project from the very beginning. Internationally renowned soloists such as Edgardo Rocha (who embodies the Count of Almaviva), Riccardo Novaro (Bartolo), Lucia Cirillo (Rosina), Giorgio Caoduro (Figaro), Ugo Guagliardo (Basilio) and Alessandra Palomba (Berta) performed on stage.

‘A beautiful song – a shame that it shows such disrespect to the Mayor!’ This remark from the score of The Golden Cockerel highlights the delicious ambiguity of this work. Principally inspired by Washington Irving and Pushkin, Rimsky-Korsakov called on the talents of Vladimir Belsky, an author of other libretti of a fairy-tale, legendary nature and an expert on Russian folk literature. The composer, a genius at orchestration, has given us sparkling music, with oriental touches, that creates fully rounded characters. This is the perfect occasion for Alain Altinoglu to direct his first opera in his new role as Music Director of La Monnaie. After the success of his Don Quichotte and Cendrillon, Laurent Pelly returns to La Monnaie to stage this exuberant political satire, an adventure in unrestrained rhythm. More than a century has passed since its first performance, yet the opera has lost none of its boisterous sarcasm.

Die Walküre (The Valkyrie), WWV 86B, is the second of the four music dramas that constitute Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, (English: The Ring of the Nibelung). It was performed, as a single opera, at the National Theatre Munich on 26 June 1870, and received its first performance as part of the Ring cycle at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 14 August 1876.

France, 1792. Chenier is an idealistic poet, in love with the aristocratic Maddalena. While Chenier supports such notions as "liberte, fraternite egalite," his sympathies do not extend to the current Reign of Terror. Likewise, the Revolutionary Tribunal has no need for poets or their girlfriends, especially those judged to be an Enemy of the State. Heads will roll.

Wagner: Die Walküre

Nápoj lásky

Nevěra se nevyplácí

Le Villi is an opera-ballet in two acts composed by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Ferdinando Fontana, based on the short story Les Willis by Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr.

Inspired by Wagner’s own tortured affair with the wife of his patron, this searing masterwork is based on Arthurian legend and tells of an illicit romance between a Breton nobleman and the Irish princess betrothed to his uncle and king. The composer’s larger-than-life sensibilities are on full display throughout the score: Along with intoxicating orchestral music that surges in tandem with the couple’s burgeoning passion and a chord left symbolically unresolved until the last moments of the opera, the opera also features one of the repertory’s most soaring and ecstatic final climaxes, as Isolde surrenders to a love so powerful that she transcends life itself.

Live performance, Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, July 2006. 'L'italiana in Algeri' (English: 'The Italian Girl in Algiers') is an operatic dramma giocoso in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Angelo Anelli, based on his earlier text set by Luigi Mosca. It premiered at the Teatro San Benedetto in Venice on 22 May 1813. The music is characteristic of Rossini's style, remarkable for its fusion of sustained, manic energy with elegant, pristine melodies.

"This is Vienna State Opera live at home". April 2015. 'L'italiana in Algeri' (English: 'The Italian Girl in Algiers') is an operatic dramma giocoso in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Angelo Anelli, based on his earlier text set by Luigi Mosca. It premiered at the Teatro San Benedetto in Venice on 22 May 1813. The music is characteristic of Rossini's style, remarkable for its fusion of sustained, manic energy with elegant, pristine melodies.

"This is Vienna State Opera live at home". April 2015.