MILAN—December 7 is a city holiday in Milan, which celebrates the feast day of its patron, Saint Ambrose. For decades now, the date has been marked by opening night at the Teatro alla Scala, Italy’s leading opera house, which throws a … » Read

CHICAGO—Challenges don’t seem to intimidate Lidiya Yankovskaya, music director of Chicago Opera Theater since 2017. And there was no lack of challenges in the company’s most recent production, Shostakovich’s satirical … » Read

Far more classical music lovers will see Bradley Cooper’s Maestro once its available on Netflix in late December than during its current limited release in movie theaters. Those seeking a “soup to nuts” chronicle of the protean … » Read

Maria Callas’s 100th birthday on Dec. 2 became such an inescapable event in the opera world that she might as well have risen from the dead. Looking like Medea in disguise as Audrey Hepburn, Callas stared out of magazine covers, Facebook … » Read

SAN FRANCISCO—It’s all about Dido at the end of Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas , the Carthaginian queen’s grief expressed in her death-scene lament that implores us to “Remember me, but ah! Forget my fate.” … » Read

Following continues Peter Clark’s review of La Divina: Maria Callas in All Her Roles, a 135-disc collection of all of her commercial recordings and many of her live performances. Part I was posted yesterday. Verdi's La Traviata , one of her … » Read

I once heard Leonard Bernstein ask a woodwind player to play a solo passage as a singer would phrase it. “Did you ever hear Callas sing?,” he said. Bernstein knew whereof he spoke, having conducted the great Greek-American diva in her … » Read

LONDON—A stone’s throw from the Barbican Centre, Milton Court is a home for the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and a place where the Barbican can present chamber works as part of its far-sighted Milton Court Artist-in-Residence … » Read

In a season where the Metropolitan Opera is devoting inordinate attention to “new” operas, prominent composers from the bread-and-butter years before World War II—Puccini being the main exception—tend to be represented by … » Read

MILAN—In recent years, Rome's Teatro dell'Opera has established itself as an artistically adventurous alternative to La Scala, its more traditional competitor in Milan. Having hosted the debut stagings of artist Ai Weiwei ( Turandot , 2022 … » Read