March 2013
Anna Netrebko is due to sing the role of Lady Macbeth for a single performance at the Bavarian State Opera in June 2014.
February 2013
Maria Agresta will sing Lucrezia in Verdi's I due Foscari in the 2014-15 season at Covent Garden. Placido Domingo does the Doge double, adding the baritone role of Francesca Foscari to his Simon Boccanegra.
Corinne Winters, fresh from her triumph as Violetta in ENO's production of La traviata, is to return to the Coliseum next season as Teresa in Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini. Michael Spyres sings the title role in a production which sees the return of Terry Gilliam to the director's seat, after his Damnation of Faust debut.
Linda Richardson is to sing the title role in Welsh National Opera's upcoming Anna Bolena. Robert McPherson sings Lord Percy and Katharine Goeldner is Giovanna Seymour.
March 2012
While the 2012-13 season has recently been announced at Covent Garden, it doesn’t stop speculation and insider information about the seasons ahead continuing unabated.
We hear that Puccini’s Manon Lescaut will feature Kristine Opolais and Jonas Kaufmann, while the much-anticipated new production of Verdi’s Les vêpres siciliennes, directed by Stefan Herheim, has a cast including Erwin Schrott, Marina Poplavskaya, Bryan Hymel and Michael Volle. Simon O’Neill is set to appear in a new production of Parsifal. Ailyn Pérez returns as Liu in Turandot, as well as a run of La Traviata opposite husband Stephen Costello.
Further ahead, resident baritone Plácido Domingo returns in 2014 to sing the Doge, not in Simon Boccanegra this time, but I due Foscari, opposite Marina Poplavskaya.
Antonio Pappano will finally brings William Tell to Covent Garden, after his successful Santa Cecilia concert performances/ recording, as well as a new production of Cavalleria rusticana / Pagliacci . The new 2012-13 Met Maria Stuarda, with Joyce DiDonato, is set to cross the pond. Mariusz Kwiecien is set to star in a new production of Szymanowski’s Krol Roger and there are rumours of a David McVicar production of Andrea Chenier with Jonas Kaufmann, while 2016 may just see Anna Netrebko star in Norma.
July 2011
Carmen Gianattasio will sing the title role in Donizetti's Caterina Cornaro at Covent Garden.
The new Manon at La Scala will be the first of five new co-productions with The Royal Opera, including La donna del lago and Die Frau ohne Schatten. Other future productions at Covent Garden include Ariadne auf Naxos with Jane Archibald as Zerbinetta.
The young American tenor Michael Fabbiano will sing Edgardo in Andrei Serban's new production of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Opera Bastille in Paris. There is also talk of the Metropolitan Opera workshopping Michael Torke's opera Senna with a view to an ENO co-production, with Fabbiano taking the role of the dead racing driver.
May 2011
The new season at La Scala has been unveiled, with a raft of new productions, including Don Giovanni, Die Frau ohne Schatten, Peter Grimes, Lusia Miller, Manon, Siegfried and Rigoletto.
Daniel Barenboim conducts the season opener, Don Giovanni, directed by Robert Carsen, starring Anna Netrebko, Elina Garanca, Bryn Terfel and Peter Mattei. Carsen’s production of Les contes d’Hoffmann returns, with Ramón Vargas as Hoffmann. Liudmyla Monastyrska, the recent Covent Garden Aida, takes on the role in Milan
Semyon Bychkov conducts the new production of Strauss’ Die Frau ohne Schatten, which features Emily Magee and Johan Botha. Claus Guth directs.
Richard Jones directs the new Peter Grimes, with John Mark Ainsley in the title role, Susan Gritton as Ellen Orford and Christopher Purves as Balstrode.
The new Luisa Miller features Elena Mosuc, Marcelo Álvarez and Leo Nucci, while Manon stars Natalie Dessay.
Angela Gheorghiu, Anna Netrebko and Anita Hartig share the role of Mimi in a revival of La bohème, conducted by Daniele Rustioni.
Barenboim returns to conduct Siegfried in a staging by Guy Cassiers. Lance Ryan sings Siegfried, Juha Uusitalo is The Wanderer, Nina Stemme Brünnhilde.
The season closes with Gustavo Dudamel conducting Rigoletto, which features George Gagnidze, Nino Machaidze and Vittorio Grigolo.
Discover the full season here.
1st April 2011
Breaking news:
British favourite Lesley Garrett will sing the title role in Strauss’s Elektra in a special charity concert performance at Wigmore Hall next week. All proceeds will be donated to Comic Relief.
Renée Fleming is to sing her first Isolde at the Greenwich Playhouse Festival in Spring 2014.
Following the success of his Rigoletto, Plácido Domingo will star as Boris Godunov in a live telecast to be filmed entirely in Russia.
The second series of TV show Popstar to Operastar will require contestants to actually sing all their arias in the correct key. Katherine Jenkins will sadly not be on the judging panel this year as she is too busy preparing for the role of Lady Macbeth with New Cornwall Opera.
Calixto Bieito’s new production of Die Fledermaus for the Staatsoper Stuttgart will be set in the mortuary of a U.S army field hospital in Afghanistan. Co-production with ENO and La Monnaie.
Russell Watson further establishes his classical credentials with his eagerly-anticipated new album Russell Watson sings Wagner. Due to be released on 14th June, highlights include the love duet from Tristan und Isolde where Watson will be joined by the delectable Danielle de Niese.
March 2011
We can reveal that Anna Netrebko will open the new season at La Scala, Milan, in Don Giovanni. Other productions in the 2011-12 season include Le nozze di Figaro, Don Pasquale, Aida, Luisa Miller, Rigoletto, Siegfried, Les contes d'Hoffmann, Manon, La bohème, Tosca, Die Frau ohne Schatten and Peter Grimes.
This news has been brought to our attention via an anonymous source. Further details and confirmation about the full La Scala season will follow in due course.
November 2010
German soprano Anja Harteros is to sing Suor Angelica at Covent Garden in 2011, with Desdemona and Elisabetta to follow (specific season dates for the Otello and Don Carlos to follow.)
Marianne Cornetti is to sing Abigaille at La Monnaie in April 2011.
Rolando Villazon has been replaced by Matthew Polenzani in the Metropolitan Opera's upcoming Eugene Onegin.
Eva Maria Westbroek is to sing Francesca da Rimini at the Metropolitan Opera in 2013
Erwin Schrott is to star in Verdi's I Vespri Siciliani at Covent Garden (specific date to follow).
September 2010
Dutch soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek, is to sing Elisabeth in Wagner's Tannhäuser in The Teatro Municipal, Santiago, Chile in 2011.
Cheryl Barker will be in Perth (Western Australia) in November 2011 to sing excerpts from Der Rosenkavalier with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, along with Catherine Carby (Octavian) and Sara Macliver (Sophie).
La Calisto, featuring countertenor David Daniels, has been pulled from The Royal Opera House schedule for 2012.
English National Opera will stage Handel's Giulio Cesare in 2012.
Coloratura soprano Eglise Gutierrez, is to sing all four heroines in Offenbach's Les contes d'Hoffmann at the Teatro Liceu, Barcelona in 2013.
In 2011 Kent Nagano will conduct the Russian National Orchestra in concert performances of The Ring to announce his inauguration as their Musical Director (following the Pletnev debacle).
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commissioned to design the booklet cover for this disc of Verdi arias and duets featuring Polish tenor Piotr Beczala, it would feature an image of a Brazil nut, emblazoned with the face of dear old Giuseppe, quivering beneath a sledgehammer. This would give the prospective purchaser an idea as to what to expect from the tenor’s approach and it would, indeed, be as unexpected as it is disappointing. I rate Beczala extremely highly and he would be in my top four tenors performing this sort of repertoire today (Jonas Kaufmann, Joseph Calleja and the underrated Marcelo Álvarez being the others), but this recital disc will do his reputation few favours.
based at the Wigmore Hall, offer a rather unique opportunity to hear some of the world’s most impressive singers to best effect, performing their own chosen repertoire in an intimate concert setting. There is a welcome purity in hearing an artist sing a concentrated programme of music tailored to their voice and taste, and to hear it unembellished by full-scale orchestra, granted only the elegant simplicity of an accompanying piano.
As if to remind us that summer festivals are just around the corner, despite the prevailing frozen conditions over much of Britain, Opus Arte has issued its new production of Janacek’s evergreen opera The Cunning Little Vixen, which opened Glyndebourne’s 2012 season. Although Melly Still’s production didn’t meet with universal acclaim and is clumsily directed at times, the performances here have much to recommend them, not least the feisty Vixen of Lucy Crowe and the weathered Forester of Sergei Leiferkus.
