All Reviews

El retorn d’una veu pianística al seu espai natural Hi ha intèrprets que, quan pugen a un escenari determinat, activem en nosaltres una mena de memòria col·lectiva: sabem que aquell lloc, aquella acústica i aquell artista formen un tot indissoluble. Alba Ventura i el Palau de la Música Catalana constitueixen un d’aquests binomis rars i fèrtils. La pianista barcelonina ha crescut musicalment i vitalment entre aquestes pedres modernistes, hi ha viscut molts dels seus primers èx

The Temporada d'Òpera de Catalunya, the Sabadell Opera, had never dared to perform Wagner and for the first time, yesterday, presented Der Fliegende Holländer at the Teatre de la Faràndula in Sabadell. Although it is a short Wagner, it is not easy at all, neither scenically nor musically. The Sabadell Opera, however, always surprises us. The commitment of the Sabadell Opera has been capital. Not only to stage Der Fliegende Holländer but to do so with a young cast and above

The Metropolitan Opera in New York closes out 2025 by staging a production by the legendary Nicolas Joël, who was artistic director of the Paris Opera between 2009 and 2014, and who passed away just five years ago in 2020. As is always the case with the Metropolitan Opera, its commitment to this revival is a commitment to tradition, and in this case, to the tradition of theatrical savoir-faire. The production with which Joël debuted at The Met in 1996, with Pavarotti in the c

Rome kicks off its opera season with the world premiere of a new production of Richard Wagner's Lohengrin, directed by Damiano Michieletto. Following its run in Rome, the new production will travel to Venice and Valencia. The staging is fresh, innovative and dazzling. The set design and its structures, with their pure forms that seek the essence of the elements, seem to have sprung from the studio of a genius of design and architecture: Paolo Fantin. This new production, it's

The Teatro Comunale di Bologna has revived the celebrated La Bohème, a production conceived by stage director Graham Vick three years after his death, in 2018, inspired by the Bologna of university students. It was revived again in 2021, the year of the British director's death, as a tribute, and now it is once more celebrated in Bologna as a contemporary and fresh interpretation of Puccini's classic. This time, however, the opera has been temporarily moved to the Teatro Comu

El mítico Elisir d'Amore  creado por Mario Gas en 1983, ambientado en la Italia fascista, que se repuso la temporada 1997/1998 en el Teatro Victoria, con aún el Liceu en reconstrucción, y que ha dado la vuelta por medio mundo, ha vuelto a aterrizar en el Liceu estos días. Es una producción sencilla en lo escenográfico, como lo es el cine realista italiano en el que Gas se inspiró, con ese regusto a Ladri di biciclete , pero riquísima en colores y movimiento escénico. Aunque a

Das Theater Münster präsentierte eine Neuinszenierung von Wagners Tristan und Isolde, die sich mit beeindruckender Klarheit und künstlerischer Konsequenz von vielen regieexperimentellen Irrwegen der Gegenwart absetzt. Die Inszenierung bewegt sich souverän zwischen Realität und Traumwelt. Der erste Aufzug spielt tatsächlich auf einem Schiff, einem militärischen Frachter, dessen kühle Härte Tristan im Licht seiner eigenen toxischen Männlichkeit bloßlegt. Der zweite Akt öffnet s

El pasado 17 de noviembre en el Auditorio de Barcelona, dentro de la 42 temporada de Ibercamera, la Orquesta Mozarteum Salzburg con Trevor Pinnock en la dirección y Julia Hagen como solista, nos ofrecieron un programa integrado por la Obertura “La Flauta Mágica” de Mozart, el Concierto para violoncelo en si menor Op 104 de A. Dvořák y la Sinfonía nº 5 en do menor de Beethoven. El concierto podemos decir que se inició tímidamente para ir creciendo en intensidad, la Obertura de

Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci, München, 6.11.2025 With a line-up featuring Elīna Garanča, Vittorio Grigolo, Yonghoon Lee and Ailyn Pérez, most major opera houses — Vienna, La Scala, or even the MET— would have sold out weeks in advance. The Bavarian State Opera, however, faced noticeably empty seats, a situation that has become increasingly common. It would be easy to attribute this solely to the house’s chronically unfocused marketing, which fails to build genuine anticipat

The Maid of Orleans, Amsterdam, 15.11.2025 Tchaikovsky’s The Maid of Orleans fuses grand choral tableaux with an intimate psychological portrait of Joan of Arc. In Amsterdam, Dmitri Tcherniakov reframes the opera as a modern courtroom drama: Joan is tried for extremism, confined in a metal cage, abused, hallucinating and, in the end, driven to self-immolation that kills everyone around her. While some conceptual ideas are recognisable, the staging repeatedly collapses under i

The Hungarian State Opera in Budapest, with its extensive and continuous repertoire, has made a bold undertaking these past few days with its production of Richard Wagner's Lohengrin . And it has done so with a powerful staging by András Almási-Tóth. The stage director situates the story of the Swan Knight in a fin-de-siècle setting, yet interwoven with elements of our own time, making the production timeless, especially in the second act when two contrasting rooms appear, h

Teatro alla Scala presents Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Così fan tutte, one of the Salzburg genius's most brilliant and comical operas. This production by Robert Carsen and Luis F. Carvalho is a vibrant display of garish pastel colors, reminiscent of American candy colors, as if we were in a pink and blue Mulholland Drive burger joint. This is accompanied by simultaneous video projections and various other quirky elements, all in keeping with the latest trends in stage design. T

On November 13, 2025, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, led by its principal conductor Simone Young, presented a concert version of Richard Wagner's Siegfried to the Sydney audience. The Australian conductor, after establishing herself in Bayreuth and at La Scala as one of the leading contemporary Wagner interpreters, decided to bring a cast worthy of Bayreuth to the Sydney Opera House's Concert Hall. Young conducts with passion, composure, and supreme energy, giving her Wagner

On Saturday, the Opéra Garnier in Paris premiered the production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro done by Netia Jones in 2022, with a new cast. Da Ponte's celebrated libretto, based on Beaumarchais's work and a key embryo of the French revolutionary movement, returned to Paris in a stage interpretation by Netia Jones that attempts to expose the power dynamics surrounding an opera house, setting the action backstage at the Opéra Garnier itself. The idea is bril

Today, November 13, 2025, the Palau de la Música Catalana paid a profound tribute to one of the greatest baritones of all time: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. His most worthy heir, Benjamin Appl, wove together an extraordinary program of carefully chosen pieces to illustrate the life of the great singer and multifaceted artist, as Appl himself demonstrated. Appl was accompanied by the South African-born pianist, James Baillieu. Bailieu is not a pianist, he is God. His hands don't

Jessica Pratt is the true diva of bel canto . These days in Florence, she is crowned as a true diva in the stratospheric role of Lucrezia Borgia. Her vocal range is absolutely complete and, moreover, tailor-made for this role, in the tragic depths of her lower notes and the piercing, stellar quality of her higher ones. Pratt delivers a Lucrezia unlike any heard in Italy for years. Powerful, regal, electric, with breathtaking breath control, and high notes as clean and delicat

The Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra arrived in Barcelona in full force, accompanied by Myung-Whun Chung, the newly appointed principal conductor of the La Scala Orchestra in Milan, and the extraordinary violinist Maxim Vengerov. They performed two fundamental monuments of Russian musical literature: Tchaikovsky's exquisitely romantic Violin Concerto and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, the piece that forever shattered the traditional conventions of harmony and symphonic music. T

One of Verdi's most profound and late works, Otello, was presented at the Opéra national du Rhin with a minimalist concept by Ted Huffman. Everything is concentrated on Shakespeare's human drama and the power of his characters; the set design adds nothing of interest, except for Bertrand Couderc's dramatic lighting. Speranza Scappucci is a conductor with a promising future who has toured the world's greatest opera houses, such as the Met, La Scala, and the Royal Opera House (

As happened last year with Rheingold, Calixto Bieito's production was so highly anticipated, given the director's track record in other productions such as his Tristan und Isolde at the Vienna State Opera, that the final result is disappointing. Bieito is no longer the director he once was, and when Wagner becomes complex and grandiose with his absolute Gesamtkunstwerk – Der Ring des Nibelungen – Bieito pales in comparison. This time, the main stage prop is a fresh robotic do

Ayer el Palau de la Música Catalana tuvo el placer de presenciar un concierto de Martha Argerich, leyenda viva del piano, y su amigo Nelson Goerner, otro genio de las teclas. Todo empezó perfecto hasta que las autoridades catalanas decidieron avisar por notificación de emergencias en el momento que Argerich y Goerner tocaban La Valse de Ravel. Argerich, muy enfadada y nerviosa, paró el concierto y no entendía nada, porque cada vez sonaban más móviles y más fuerte. Ella que vi