As the Metropolitan Opera struggles to redefine itself, the company reached back nearly a half century on Sunday afternoon to John Dexter’s classic production of Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites. Though last revived just four … » Read

Suicide-prevention warnings are now common in many quarters—even, apparently, opera.  David Lang’s note to a friend premiered at the Prototype Festival, Jan. 12-15 (I attended the final performance) with one: “This … » Read

LONDON--Last year, the Irish National Opera (INO) production of Vivaldi’s Bajazet —the first opera by the Venetian composer to be staged at London’s Royal Opera House—won them multiple awards. This year, the same … » Read

In The Beloved Vision: A History of Nineteenth Century Music , Stephen Walsh has written a clear and insightful history of Romanticism in music. The author, an emeritus professor at Cardiff University, frames his study with what historians call … » Read

LONDON—Simon Rattle is on record as saying that his inspiration to become an opera conductor came from the work of Czech composer Leoš Janácek. It’s not surprising then that this January 11 concert performance of Katya … » Read

Plunked down right in the middle of the Prototype Festival’s usually ultra-serious fare of experimental chamber opera came the first night, on Tuesday, of the latest revival of Donizetti’s frothy charmer L’Elisir d’amore … » Read

The Prototype Festival makes reputations more for creators than for performers, the latest being Emma O’Halloran, an emerging Irish composer here shown to be an important new voice. Her double bill, Trade/Mary Motorhead, a coproduction … » Read

The combination of Thomas Søndergård, music director designate of the Minnesota Orchestra; the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; and Jean Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2 produced an evening of music that drove one critic to superlatives. … » Read

Du Yun is a Shanghai- and U.S.- trained composer and performer, now based in New York. Her best-known works are the opera Angel’s Bone , first heard in 2016 at the Prototype Festival in New York and winner of the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for … » Read

One needn’t look far for premieres of new music in the New York Philharmonic’s current season, but few will have the sheer size or impose the interpretive challenges of Finnish composer Magnus Lindberg’s Third Piano Concerto. … » Read