Schwetzingen is a tiny town near Heidelberg which has a famous palace with magnificent gardens, not unlike those at Versailles. The Schwetzingen Festival is held every Spring in the palace and commissions a small-scale opera for the palace's…

One of Rossini's masterpieces; a frothy little farce on the surface with an underlying sharp social critique.

This opera is based on the Greek legend of Ulysses and his return to Ithaca after years at the Trojan wars.

Sir Peter Hall's outstanding Glyndebourne Festival Opera production of "Fidelio" remains remarkably faithful to the way Beethoven intended the opera to be. He managed to inject fresh excitement and suspense into "Fidelio", providing a perfect…

The action of the opera takes place in Naples and tells the story of the cynical Don Alfonso who convinces the officers Ferrando and Guglielmo that no women can be trusted.

Mozart's 'Don Giovanni', "the opera of all operas", as E.T.A. Hoffman once called it, is a work with many meanings. Peter Hall and Bernard Haitink's interpretation of the Mozart cycle was enthusiastically received at the Glyndebourne festival.

Mozart's "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" is best loved for its memorable music and lively wit. The opera tells the story of the efforts of a Spanish nobleman to rescue his betrothed who is held captive against her will in a Turkish harem.

Glyndebourne's 1978 production of Mozart's "Die Zauberflöte" received as much critical acclaim for the imaginative David Hockney sets as for the operatic performances. Hockney emphasised the magical and mystical qualities of one of Mozart's best…

Composed by Jean Baptiste Lully for Louis XIV, Persée is widely recognized as Lully's greatest creation and was considered the crowning achievement of 17th century French music theatre. Filled with dancing, fight scenes, monsters and special effects…

Little Red Riding Hood begins, like all fairy tales, with: "Once upon a time..." For children of all ages the composer Georges Aperghis imagined a tale in music and movement: he chose the very first version written by Charles Perrault almost 300…