Features

To the end: Ian Page has selected six pieces to complete Zaide, which will be sung in English

How to execute Mozart's unknown ending

Mozart left his opera Zaide uncompleted and with his heroes facing death. Ian Page explains how he finished what the composer started

Inside Features

Observations: A case of real musical piracy

Friday, 18 June 2010

Sir Francis Drake may have been a pirate, but he also had a civilised side: he took four viol-players with him on his plundering voyage round the world in 1577-80. They played hymns and psalms to him every day, and he also used them to convey messages of peace to native peoples. This little-known fact is the basis for the extraordinary work which Orlando Gough and the Fretwork ensemble will unveil at Kings Place, London, tomorrow. Fretwork's Richard Boothby – who made a similar trip on his father's meat-ship in the Sixties – came up with the idea: "It seemed the perfect excuse for our viols to represent all the styles of the world as Drake found them, as well as presenting the music which he would have heard on board."

ENO podcast: Edward Gardner

Monday, 14 June 2010

Edward Gardner is no longer English National Opera's best kept secret. The former choral scholar and repetiteur goes from strength to strength helming ENO through productive and interesting times.

Classical podcast: Ian Page

Tuesday, 8 June 2010

The Classical Opera Company does exactly what it says on the tin and over the last few years has refreshed parts of the repertoire and corners of the nation that their bigger and more illustrious counterparts never reach.

Garsington Opera's tenure goes out with a flourish with Rossini's most exotic opera

Friday, 4 June 2010

This is the last year of Garsington Opera's tenure in its quirky medieval manor – next year it moves to the Getty family's home at Wormley.

How to make Bizet's gem shine anew

Monday, 31 May 2010

The Pearl Fishers isn't the most PC of operas, says director Penny Woolcock, but that doesn't mean we should dismiss it

Observations: Figaro turns to tango

Friday, 28 May 2010

Erwin Schrott's dressing room is a-buzz. In walks a fellow Uruguayan to exchange fraternal greetings, then a dancer to collect his motorbike boots. Then a soprano comes in and parks her sleeping infant in a corner of the room: this is Anna Netrebko, Schrott's other half, about to open in Covent Garden's Manon: their son Tiago Arua is not quite two.