Joseph Calleja reviews
Verdi: Arias from Aida, Il Trovatore, La forza del destino, Don Carlo and Otello
Joseph Calleja; Angela Gheorghiu, Vittorio Vitelli; Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana/Ramón Tebar (Decca)
Bellini: Norma
Sondra Radvanovsky, Joyce DiDonato, Joseph Calleja, Matthew Rose; Metropolitan Opera Chorus & Orchestra/Carlo Rizzi; dir. David McVicar (Erato; DVD)
Watch Antonio Pappano conduct Bellini's Norma
First staged on 12 September 2016, the Royal Opera’s new Normawas the work of Spanish director Alex Ollé, one of the artistic co-directors of the theatre group La Fura dels Baus. In a programme note included with this DVD/Blu-ray release he asks the rhetorical questions, ‘Some will see [Norma] as a traitor to her country and her religion, but what is she really guilty of having done? Falling in love?