Best opera of all time? The Marriage of Figaro was hugely popular when it premiered (1786) and ever since. But it nearly didn't happen. ...

Would Mozart have approved? His music is untouched (and splendidly sung) in Victorian Opera's production of an entirely new opera - new...

The Abduction from the Seraglio , a year after Idomeneo , took Mozart into the "far east", and far from opera seria . It's a " singspiel...

Idomeneo is poised at the pass between Baroque and Classical opera. Commissioned for an opera seria , Mozart turned to Greek mythology...

"Music, even in situations of the greatest horror, should never be painful to the ear but should flatter and charm it, and thereby always...

Opera has several foolish women demanding to know who their lover is, but Semele's punishment was particularly harsh. She was the only...

Alcina (1735) was composed for Handel's new company, the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. It ran for 18 performances, the last, and...

With Saul , after 40-odd operas, Handel shifted across to oratorio. There are lots of official explanations: English audiences had...

Handel's 'Julius Caesar in Egypt' is a fairly faithful account of Caesar's Egypt adventures, according to historians. His librettists...

As the Baroque era shifted in Europe, the excitement moved back to Britain. Purcell (1659-1695) had provided the early Baroque music and...

The operas of the "greatest French composer of the century" were mainly about gods, with the exception of Platée , which is about...

Born in Florence, 1632, with musical and dancing skills, Lully made his way from Italian city life to become first, 'chamber boy' to a...

Purcell's Dido and Aeneas is widely seen as the dawn of English Baroque - and the best of British opera - at least before Britten. It...

Enter Henry Purcell, the leading - indeed pretty much only - creator of Baroque opera (and then only one) in Britain.  Titania, Bottom...

What could go wrong for Cavalli? His singing voice was beautiful, his father was the maestro di cappella of the duomo of Crema,...

Emperor Nero has been likened to many leaders in our times, most recently of course, to Trump. The comparison is not pretty, and it...

The Coronation of Poppea premieres in 1643, 36 years after L'Orfeo , at the end of Monteverdi's life. He is 76. So much has happened...

For Monteverdi , "The end of all good music is to affect the soul". To do this, good music communicates ideas, speaks of thoughts and...

Our Opera Group is entering its tenth year. We've explored opera in every century and most countries, and we've never run out of new...