LONDON--The Royal Opera has done well by Britten’s (and Britain’s) most revered opera, and over the years each new production has been indelibly associated with its inaugural fisherman. First was Peter Pears in 1947, not long after … » Read

Joe Moran, a professor of English and cultural history at Liverpool John Moores University, loved to sing, and for most of his adult life did so only for his own pleasure. But three years ago, he joined a sea-shanty choir and discovered … » Read

Time was when an integral performance of Schumann’s four symphonies would, as a matter of course, be accompanied by a response to attacks that Schumann lacked ability as a symphonist and, especially, as an orchestrator.  In an extreme … » Read

PARIS--Reactions to Leonard Bernstein’s late-life output vary according to taste, both ours and his. That goes for his compositions as well as his conducting, since the creative spirit that had wowed the world with a flow of unpretentious … » Read

From 1941 to 1944, more than 142,000 Jews passed through Terezín, a Nazi concentration camp located in a remote Bohemian fortress town en route to Auschwitz. Unlike their ultimate destination, Terezín was not a death camp: It served … » Read

Comprehension was only a nominal objective and not particularly necessary in Book of Mountains & Seas the new stage work by composer Huang Ruo and director/designer Basil Twist that was salvaged from the COVID-cancelled Prototype Festival and … » Read

The Odessa Opera and Ballet, the Ukraine’s oldest opera house, has become a center of resistance for this Black Sea port’s efforts to fend off Russian invaders. Built in 1887, it finds itself reprising its role of 80 years ago, when … » Read

Russian conductor Tugan Sokhiev, who  recently quit as musical director and principal conductor of the Bolshoi Theater in protest against the invasion of Ukraine, will not be coming Stateside on March 31 to conduct the New York Philharmonic, … » Read

LONDON--Few orchestras understand the meaning of invasion, occupation, and oppression like the Czech Philharmonic, as well as appreciating the power of music when it comes to making a stand. In its 126-year history it has programmed patriotic … » Read

PARIS—Ivo van Hove’s 2019 co-production with the Metropolitan Opera of Mozart’s so-called “director’s graveyard” opera, due to land at the Met on May 5, is an exhilarating, physical, all-enveloping piece of … » Read