When the most voluptuous, sought-after courtesan in the world meets an ascetic monk whose life is devoted to God, you know erotic sparks are going to fly. And when the clash takes place in a glorious, but rarely performed, opera by Massenet, it’s a delight to the ear just as much as to the eye. Renée Fleming is every inch the glamorous Thaïs, swathed in elegant gowns designed by Christian Lacroix. Thomas Hampson is Athanaël, the tortured man of God. This production by John Cox, which premiered in December 2008, brilliantly sets the stage for a confrontation as old as civilization itself.

A 12-year-old boy tries everything to join a music lovers club.

A version of Benjamin Britten's opera based on the Melville story. Will the virtuous young sailor Bi...

With his affinity for the 16th-century sculptor Benvenuto Cellini's advocacy of artistic and persona...

An excellent performance of this delightful opera. The principals are superb, especially the sisters...

Richard Wagner's Parsifal, staged at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo in 2020, opened the opera season ...

Part of an epoch-making release of Mozart's complete operas on DVD, here is the 18-year old composer...

Disciplined Italian composer Antonio Salieri becomes consumed by jealousy and resentment towards the...

Who loves whom in Così fan tutte, Mozart’s and Da Ponte’s cruelly comic reflection on desire, fideli...

This is a good video of "Figaro", but there are a couple of better ones available. The Bohm and the ...

All the throbbing eroticism—and ultimate heartbreak—of Puccini’s youthful score is unleashed by Jame...

After the acclaimed Met premiere of Thomas Adès's "The Tempest" in 2012, the composer returned with ...

Sir David McVicar’s bold new staging of Tosca, Puccini’s operatic thriller of Napoleonic Rome, thril...

A rarely performed bel canto gem, Rossini’s Semiramide returned to the Met for the first time in nea...

Premiered immediately before the enduring masterpieces Rigoletto, Il Trovatore, and La Traviata, Lui...

Deep in a forest where druids and warriors seek revenge against the conquering Romans, Norma is scor...

Maria Callas, the world's greatest opera singer, lives the last days of her life in 1970s Paris, as ...

The grand scale and magnificent acoustics of the Roman arena in Verona are ideally suited to the pag...

Known as a creator of astonishing images, stage director and visual artist Robert Wilson delivers a ...

Performance of Schoenberg's Gurrelieder by SBR, conducted by Mariss Jansons