(SOUNDBITE OF HANDEL'S "LA RESURREZIONE (1708), HWV 47 / PARTE PRIMA: 'DISSERRATEVI, O PORTE D'AVERNO'") GROSS: Sometimes we can overlook something that's right under our noses. Classical music critic ...

Nights (and Afternoons) at the Opera / This is the fifth entry in a series examining the works that the Metropolitan Opera will present through April during its "The Met: Live in HD" series in local ...

Handel: Opera arias. Danielle de Niese, Les Arts Florissants, conducted by William Christie (Decca 475 8746, full price) I WONDER whether Universal signed Danielle de Niese before they'd actually ...

Best known as Mozart’s Figaro and Leporello, D’Arcangelo does wonders for Handel’s overlooked bass arias. A whole disc may seem like overload, but the programme is full of variety and D’Arcangelo ...

The debut recital disc by the Russian soprano Julia Lezhneva two years ago, a collection of Baroque selections aptly titled “Alleluia,” suggested the arrival of a formidable vocal talent, one blessed ...

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Semele has a problem. She has fallen for Jupiter, the king of the gods, and he for her, but if she asks for the ...

Handel did full-frontal grief and anger in 40-plus operas which were, until recently, regarded as unstageable. Opera Theatre Ireland's James Conway, who has made a point of producing them, to acclaim, ...

“Opera proibita” means forbidden opera. The Catholic Church essentially banned opera during the first decade of the 18th Century in Rome, leading to the rise of the Italian oratorio. As a result, ...

Iestyn Davies is already known and rightly feted for his contributions to recordings of baroque opera and oratorio as well as for a number of solo albums, not least his Hyperion programme of arias for ...

Another amazing virtuosic display in Handel arias from another fine mezzo on the cusp of stardom! While there have been releases of amazing Handel singing in recent times, this disc is distinguished ...

And in one of those stacks, released a decade ago, was an album of early Handel soprano arias by a singer I didn't know at the time. The surprise was that the soprano on the CD, 10 years younger, was ...