It's an event that draws many thousands of music lovers to one of the most beautiful cities in the world every summer: the opera season at the ancient Arena di Verona. The 2,000-year-old roman amphiteatre with its gigantic stage dimensions is one of the largest and best preserved Roman construction of its kind, and with over 22,000 seats it is undoubtedly one of the most spectacular open-air venues of the world! The revered master of opera Franco Zeffirelli, who died shortly before the premiere of Il Trovatore, created a legendary scenery with groups of giant sized armoured knights, a fortress turning into a luminous cathedral, an enormous choir, horses, breathtaking fights: “his perhaps best arena production” (Opernglas). It brings Anna Netrebko to the Arena of Verona where she is giving her much-anticipated debut in one of Giuseppe Verdi’s most popular operas.
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André Rieu - Christmas in London (2016)
Christmas is now more beautiful and cosy than ever! Experience Christmas in London, together with André Rieu. Decorated Christmas trees everywhere you look, beautifully lit streets, tempting Christmas window displays... Combine the unique London Christmas atmosphere with a magnificent Christmas concert by André Rieu, and you have all the ingredients for a lovely party in the dark December days. Together with fantastic soloists and his always joyful Johann Strauss orchestra, André Rieu provides a fabulous evening with the most beautiful and moving Christmas carols, but also with emotional songs such as Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, The Holy City and the classic Concierto de Aranjuez. Christmas in London means an evening enjoying lovely music, beautiful costumes and plenty of London cosiness.
Rimsky-Korsakov: The Golden Cockerel (2021)
Pushkin folk tale as comedic opera whose sultry elements expand an Oriental influence. Korsakov portrays the story of Tsar Nicholas II, punished for his cowardice and despotism, using satire to condemn Russia's autocratic ruler.
Donizetti La Favorite (2015)
One of the composer's most beguiling scores, La Favorite is Gaetano Donizetti's La favorita in it's original French form; a tale of love and war that represents a glorious mix of Italian bel canto and 19th c. grand opera. Vincent Boussard's arresting Toulouse production does full justice to this newly renewed masterpiece. Three international principals take on the work's demanding roles: Chinese tenor Yijie Shi is a 'revelation' as Fernand, the rich-toned, authoritative French baritone Ludovic Tezier as King Alphonse XI and lauded American mezzo Kate Aldrich - 'the Carmen of this generation' - plumbing the emotional depths of Leonor's music. Conductor and bel canto specialist Antonello Allemandi adds to the passionate proceedings onstage. Maestro Allemandi demonstrated full authority over the stage for the musically complex scenes, and in the arias and duets demonstrated his confidence in the singers by establishing ample tempos to support their soaring vocal lines.
Maria Callas: Toujours (Paris 1958) (1958)
The career of Maria Callas was just a bit too early and too brief to receive full and satisfying video documentation like that now being accorded to such singers as Renée Fleming and Luciano Pavarotti. This black-and-white televised recital (Callas's Paris debut) took place at the Paris Opera on December 19, 1958 when television was still in its infancy. We might wish that it had happened earlier, when her voice was in better condition, or later, when video recording technology was more advanced--so that, for example, we would not have to take the narrator's word that Callas is wearing a red dress. But this is probably the best available Callas video recording, and her fans will welcome it warmly. Visual elements were as important as the vocal dimensions in her art.
Maria Callas in Concert - Hamburg 1959 and 1962 (1962)
The 1959 concert finds Callas just 1 year before the loss of her voice and although her voice is not what it was in 1952 you can still hear the Vocal Miracle. The repertoire interchanges between heavy dramatic soprano (Lady Macbeth, Elisabetta), to soprano coloratura (Rosina) and to soprano dramatico d'agilita (Imogene in Pirata, Gulia). The maturity of the interpretation regarding the legatti, the phrasing is astounding and Callas dominates each aria singing them in the only possible way. "Tu che invoco" appears as a cataract of dramatic phrases in a fine classical style of this classical period opera, then Lady Macbeth appears diabolical & dark although she avoids keeping her voice in the high C, her Rosina is sparkling and facile in the coloratura as if it is a natural way of speaking and Elisabetta is where time stops: the drama in this aria holds a metaphysical aura. Finally her entire Mad Scene from Pirata shows all her talent as an actress and bel canto singer.
Elektra (2010)
The richness and intensity of Richard Strauss's masterful one-act opera, in Herbert Wernicke's compelling production, vividly portrays the relentless pursuit and ecstatic realization of vengeance. Featuring Linda Watson, Jane Henschel, Manuela Uhl, Rene Kollo, and Albert Dohmen. The Philharmonia Chor Wien and Münchner Philharmoniker are conducted by Christian Thielemann
The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama (1999)
"Rosa", with a libretto by Peter Greenaway and score by Louis Andriessen, is the first in a projected series of 10 operas, each dealing with the death of a famous composer - some real, others fictional. "Rosa" falls into the latter category; it tells the story of Juan Manuel de Rosa, a Brazilian who went to study music in America but spent most of his time in the cinema instead, becoming particularly entranced by Westerns. Now 32 years old and residing in an abandoned Uruguayan slaughterhouse, Rosa has become one of Hollywood's foremost composers, specialising in Westerns. He also has a beautiful 19-year-old fiancee, Esmeralda, but he pays her little heed, instead lavishing his attentions on a black mare named Bola. One day, a group of men attired as cowboys arrive at the abattoir and kill both Rosa and Bola; an investigation is conducted, with particular suspicion!
Mozart: Don Giovanni (2008)
A striking interpretation of Mozart's opera that became a sensation at the 2008 Salzburg Festival. This is not only a rethinking of the place and time of the opera, but also a deep disclosure of the characters' characters, their ambiguous inner world. A simple, at first glance, plot is turned by the creators of the play into a dynamic psychological thriller.
Falstaff (1993)
It is to composer and librettist Arrigo Boito and his constant pestering of the octogenarian Verdi that there remained within him one last great comedy fighting to get out that we owe this absolute miracle of an opera. Produced in 1893 as Verdi turned 80 there is much in this masterpiece that can be identified as a modernist neoclassical work. The use of short motifs instead of long arioso melodic lines, the spry and reduced orchestral textures and the lack of a single 'stand and deliver' dramatic declamatory aria all serve to make this more of a 20th century work than an example of 19th century late-Romanticism.
La forza del destino (1950)
Film version of the Verdi opera about lovers on the run after the accidental death of the girl's father.
In War and Peace - Harmony Through Music (2018)
Recorded live in June 2017 at the magnificent Liceu Theatre in Barcelona, this DVD is the companion to Joyce DiDonato’s award-winning album In War and Peace: Harmony through Music. Seeking answers to the existential question “In the midst of chaos, how do you find peace?”, it makes a compelling piece of music theatre as DiDonato journeys through arias by Handel, Purcell, Monteverdi, Leo and Jommelli with Il Pomo d’Oro and conductor Maxim Emelyanychev. On stage, In War and Peace: Harmony through Music makes a compelling piece of music theatre. In Barcelona, as on the European and North American tours she made in late 2016, DiDonato was joined by the baroque orchestra Il Pomo d’Oro and its principal conductor Maxim Emelyanychev. May and June 2018 bring further performances in Portugal, France, Germany, Turkey and Hungary.
The Metropolitan Opera: Aida (2018)
With its cast of hundreds, thrilling score, and sweeping tale of love and heroics in ancient Egypt, Verdi’s Aida has long been a fixture on the stages of every major opera house in the world. For the 2018 revival of Sonja Frisell’s monumental production of this grand masterpiece, the Met assembled a truly all-star cast. Soprano Anna Netrebko takes on the title role for the first time at the Met, and mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili plays her rival, the conniving princess Amneris. Tenor Aleksandrs Antonenko is Radamès, the warrior that both women love, and Quinn Kelsey lends his robust baritone to Aida’s father, the fallen king Amonasro. Maestro Nicola Luisotti is on the podium to conduct this epic performance, filmed as part of the Met’s series of Live in HD cinema transmissions.
The Metropolitan Opera: Samson et Dalila (2018)
A towering biblical epic, Saint-Saëns’s operatic take on the story of Samson and Delilah has many of the hallmarks of grand opera—show-stopping vocal displays, thrilling choruses, and an engrossing plot set against a sweeping, pseudo-historical backdrop. It’s fitting, then, that Samson et Dalila has been chosen to celebrate the opening of the Met’s season four times in the company’s history, including when Darko Tresnjak’s bold new production premiered on the first night of the 2018–19 season. A few weeks later, the opera was shown as part of the Met’s series of live cinema transmissions, featuring an exceptional cast. Tenor Roberto Alagna was the heroic Samson, who ultimately falls victim to the seductive power of Dalila—the captivating mezzo-soprano Elīna Garanča. Bass-baritone Laurent Naouri sang the sinister High Priest of Dagon, with conductor Sir Mark Elder on the podium.
The Metropolitan Opera: Marnie (2018)
Composer Nico Muhly unveils his second new opera for the Met with this gripping reimagining of Winston Graham’s novel, set in the 1950s, about a beautiful, mysterious young woman who assumes multiple identities. Director Michael Mayer and his creative team have devised a fast-moving, cinematic world for this exhilarating story of denial and deceit, which also inspired a film by Alfred Hitchcock. Mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard sings the enigmatic Marnie, and baritone Christopher Maltman is the man who pursues her—with disastrous results. Robert Spano conducts.
The Metropolitan Opera: La Fille du Régiment (2019)
Tenor Javier Camarena and soprano Pretty Yende team up for a feast of bel canto vocal fireworks—including the show-stopping tenor aria “Ah! Mes amis,” with its nine high Cs. Alessandro Corbelli and Maurizio Muraro trade off as the comic Sergeant Sulpice, with mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe as the outlandish Marquise of Berkenfield. Enrique Mazzola conducts.
Poulenc: Dialogues des Carmélites (2019)
Yannick Nézet-Séguin leads the classic John Dexter production of Poulenc’s devastating story of faith and martyrdom. Mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard sings the touching role of Blanche and soprano Karita Mattila, a legend in her own time, returns to the Met as the Prioress.
The Metropolitan Opera: The Tales of Hoffmann (2024)
After a celebrated career as a composer of lighthearted operetta, Jacques Offenbach turned his hand to more serious fare—only to die before his one true opera was completed. That work, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, was based on a play that strung together a collection of stories by E. T. A. Hoffmann and cast the famed poet as the protagonist of his own tales. In this performance from the 2024–25 Live in HD season, French tenor Benjamin Bernheim stars as Hoffmann, four times unlucky in love. Alongside him as the objects of his affections, soprano Erin Morley is the high-flying automaton Olympia, mezzo-soprano Clémentine Margaine is the Venetian courtesan Giulietta, and soprano Pretty Yende is both the diva Stella and the ill-fated songstress Antonia. Bass-baritone Christian Van Horn portrays the four nefarious Villains who outwit Hoffmann at every turn, and mezzo-soprano Vasilisa Berzhanskaya is Hoffmann’s Muse and his companion Nicklausse, conducted by Marco Armiliato.