Annalisa Stroppa

As comparably short operas, Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci are often billed together, but seldom is the lead tenor making his double role debut as Turiddu and Canio on the same evening. At the 2015 Salzburg Easter Festival, Jonas Kaufmann did just that to rapturous praise. Universally hailed as a coup for Kaufmann, the plaudits were also showered on Philipp Stölzl for his innovative staging which includes live video projections while referencing the era of black-and-white movies.

The opera that established Verdi’s greatness as a composer, Nabucco follows the plight of the Jews as they are exiled from their homeland by the eponymous Babylonian King. This 2019 production from Verdi Festival Parma won critical acclaim for its directors, Stefano Ricci and Gianni Forte for whom opera is a means to question the world of today. The curtain rises in the bowels of a modern warship...

A bel canto jewel and one of the most technically-challenging operas of the repertoire found its dream team in 2016 at the Teatro Real de Madrid with the incredible soprano Diana Damrau as Elvira, Javier Camarena as Arturo, Ludovic Tézier as Sir Riccardo Forth, and Nicolas Testé as Sir Giorgio. The Spanish stage director Emilio Sagi’s setting of I Puritani is somber and elegant, a perfect match for the excellent musical direction of Evelino Pidò, one of the great interpreters of this repertoire.

Composed for the Paris Opéra, the romantic but ultimately tragic narrative of Donizetti’s grand opera La Favorite is set amidst the Moorish invasions of Spain and the power struggles between religion and the state in the 14th century. The novice Fernand abandons his monastery having fallen in love with the noble Léonor, not knowing that she is the King’s mistress and favourite. Drawing on traditions established by Rossini and Meyerbeer, La Favorite is noted for Donizetti’s innovative use of the orchestra and for some of his most renowned and enthralling arias. This acclaimed production opened the 2022 Donizetti Opera Festival in Bergamo, and is performed with its original French libretto.