18 DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE ACT II - NUR STILLE, STILLE, STILLE(MONOSTATOS, QUEEN OF THE NIGHT, THE LADIES)

17 DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE ACT II - PA - PA - PA - PA - PA - PA - PAPAGENO (PAPAGENO, PAPAGENA)

14 DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE ACT II -DER HOLLE RACHE KOCHT IN MEINEN HERZEN (QUEEN OF THE NIGHT)

2 DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE ACT I - ZU HILFE! ZU HILFE! (TAMINO, THE THREE LADIES)

This playlist accompanies an article in the Swan Lake Digital Programme. For more information visit, www.roh.org.uk/publications

Swan Lake Act IV Finale

Das Rheingold, WWV 86A, Scene 1: Weia! Waga! Woge, du Welle! (Live)

Performed by Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Jaap van Zweden. 
For Design Challenge 2025/26. Licensing granted from Naxos.

Das Rheingold, WWV 86A, Scene 1: Hehe! Ihr Nicker! (Live)

Das Rheingold, WWV 86A, Scene 1: Vorspiel (Live)

This extract features as part of a music article in the Royal Opera House Digital Programme for Guillaume Tell. Visit www.roh.org.uk/publications/guillaume-tell-digital-programme to find out more.

Antonio Pappano conducts the Orchestra and Chorus of Academia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. Rossini's Guillaume Tell, featuring Gerald Finley, John Osborn, Malin Byström and Marie-Nicole Lemieux. Recording appears on SoundCloud by kind permission of  of Warner Classics and is available to buy in full from their collection, online or at the Royal Opera House Shop.

Guillaume Tell Overture (finale)

Dutch soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek will return to the Royal Opera House to sing the role of Santuzza in Pietro Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana. It's a return she's extremely excited for:

'I think Cavalleria rusticana is one of the most wonderful operas ever written. It's so passionate, real and exciting', she says. 'It has you on the edge of your seat.'

'Santuzza is a woman who's been betrayed by a lover. She then betrays him and it goes horribly wrong. To sing these big duets is just amazing. It's very dramatic.'

2015 is Cavalleria rusticana-filled for Eva-Maria as in the spring she warmed up for her London performances of the opera with a run of a different production in New York:

'I'm really excited to sing Santuzza at the Metropolitan Opera and at Covent Garden. It's really interesting to reinvent yourself with Santuzza in each production. I feel extremely lucky.'

Eva-Maria's last Royal Opera House performances were as Maddalena di Coigny in Andrea Chénier — like Cavalleria rusticana, a verismo opera:

'Verismo is my favourite style of opera. I love it so much because it demands a lot of emotion, trying to stay true and giving a lot of yourself. It's less controlled in a way — I can go wild, which I love!'

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Eva-Maria Westbroek on Cavalleria rusticana

An Audio Described introduction to Tosca by The Royal Opera, directed by Oliver Mears described by Alice Gilmour.

Audio Described introduction for Tosca

An Audio Described guide for Act III of Like Water for Chocolate by The Royal Ballet.

Audio Described guide for Act III of Like Water for Chocolate by The Royal Ballet.

An Audio Described introduction for La Fille mal gardée by The Royal Ballet - part 2

Audio Described introduction for La Fille mal gardée by The Royal Ballet - part 2

An Audio Described guide for Perspectives by The Royal Ballet – Track 3: Everywhere We Go by Justin Peck

Audio Described guide for Perspectives by The Royal Ballet

An Audio Described guide for RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3

RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3 – Track 47

An Audio Described guide for RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3 

RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3 – Track 48

RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3 – Track 49 Access

RBO Spring/ Summer Season Booking Period 3 – Track 50

An Audio Described introduction to The Nutcracker by The Royal Ballet – Act I

Audio Described introduction to The Nutcracker by The Royal Ballet – Act I

An Audio Described introduction to The Nutcracker by The Royal Ballet – Act II

Audio Described introduction to The Nutcracker by The Royal Ballet – Act II

An Audio Described introduction to Ariodante – Act I

Audio Described introduction to Ariodante – Act I

An Audio Described introduction to Ariodante – Act II

Audio Described introduction to Ariodante – Act II

An Audio Described guide for Ariodante – Act III

Audio Described guide for Ariodante – Act III

An Audio Described introduction for Last Days by The Royal Opera.
Audio described by Ayza Akhtar, with script by Alice Gilmour

Audio Described introduction for Last Days

The Nutcracker Grand Pas De Deux

Act II Waltz Of The Flowers

Dance Of The Sugar Plum Fairy

Ahead of opening night of The Royal Opera's Tannhäuser, conductor Hartmut Haenchen and singers Emma Bell and Christian Gerhaher speak about Wagner's early masterpiece. 

‘It’s phenomenal music, with a truth to it that I think I seldom feel in other things’, says Bell. Haenchen agrees: ‘I always say, it’s quite simple – go, and feel what the music is telling you, and you will love it.’

‘Wagner is not only loud’, says Haenchen. ‘Mostly you have Wagner from the beginning to the end it’s four hours and a lot of noise. But it’s so different, the sound should be so different and you should play with the words and play with really extreme dynamics.’ Gerhaher agrees: ‘This is for me the right attitude, to weigh the importance of every word and clearly depict this importance by colourization, dynamical differentiation and tempo development.’

Ultimately, ‘It’s a lot more accessible than we’ve all been led to believe’, says Bell. ‘It’s been put on this pedestal and barbed wire’s been put on the stem and everyone’s said now see if you can reach through. I think that just needs to be ripped down. Just give it a go, it’s so truthful.’


Listen: Wagner’s Tannhäuser – ‘It’s an amazing discovery to feel that way about music’

The Royal Ballet's Music Director Koen Kessels talks about the importance of commissioning new music.

'Commissioning new music is one of the ways to bring about evolution in our society', he says. 'It's very difficult to find the right way to promote contemporary music and new commissions – but I think ballet, opera and stage work are the ideal field'. He always encourages composers to 'go and see and find the choreographer who you feel aligned to'.

'Choreographers recognize music in a different way from musicians', Koen explains. 'It needs to be possible to visualize the music – it needs to fit completely with the image of the story they want to tell.'

As a ballet conductor, Koen explains how 'it's always delicate to find the right mood and tempi working with dancers – to find the right and comfortable way so that the dancers can be their best on stage'. He says he compares ballet conducting with 'accompanying singers. You have following and accompanying. Accompanying means you understand the gesture, you understand the breathing – it's the same with dancers. So it's more an understanding and a trust.'

The music in the interview is from Joby Talbot's score for Christopher Wheeldon's ballet The Winter's Tale.

Royal Ballet Music Director Koen Kessels: 'New music is one way to bring evolution in our society'

The Royal Ballet’s Resident Choreographer talks about the modern dancer and confounding expectations.

‘What’s amazing about ballet and the language of ballet is that it’s in constant change’, he says. ‘There’s a sense in which these bodies today are different from the bodies 50 years ago. They’re eating better, they have a better understanding of the biomechanics of the body, they’re faster, they can turn more, they can jump higher. That’s what excites me about working with a ballet company – it’s the potential to work with a lexicon that is known and pushing that to make an alphabet that is unknown, and those two working together and hopefully inspiring an audience.’

McGregor celebrates ten years as Resident Choreographer in autumn 2016, and that long relationship with the dancers is a crucial element in his works for the Company. ‘We’re very lucky here at The Royal Ballet in that all of the dancers are incredible. They have to have incredible technique, an amazing kind of emotional capacity – they have to be able to really invest in the material. These works that we are making are about those dancers and what their facility and ability is, and us finding a marriage to be able to extend classical ballet. Ballet is not a fixed form – ballet is a form which is always looking for new horizons and new adventures.’

When creating a work McGregor enjoys mixing together dancers he has worked with many times and dancers he is new to. ‘We have over a hundred dancers here who each have an incredible individuality. When I’m thinking about casting a piece I’m always thinking about what is special about that dancer and how that might work with another dancer, and what’s going to give me something really interesting – either a tension between them or a sympathy between them that’s going to create some real magic, this alchemy.’

‘I think part of my job as Resident Choreographer here at The Royal Ballet is to shake things up a little bit’, McGregor explains. ‘I try to find collaborations or ideas or work that in some way is unexpected and hopefully refreshing to the audience. You want the work to touch people in some kind of way, and it might be emotionally, but it also might be in a way that is quite confrontational.’

For McGregor, ‘The purpose of art is to provoke debate, it’s to stimulate imagination, it’s to promote thinking. It’s not about just coming and having a nice evening and enjoying something. Enjoyment might be a part of it but it’s not the only part of it. Ultimately you want the audience to leave the auditorium with images in their head and a sense of moving in their bodies that carries them through life. And that’s a really wonderful gift if you can share that with an audience.’

This interview features music from the symphonic poem Nyx by Esa-Pekka Salonen, used by McGregor in his ballet Obsidian Tear.
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/gb/cat/4790628

‘Ballet is always looking for new adventures’ – Wayne McGregor on working with The Royal Ballet

Mozart: Cosi Fan Tutte (Schwarzkopf, Otto, Karajan) (1954)

Cosi fan tutte: Act I Scene 3: Come scoglio immoto resta (Fiordiligi)

In an interview with Sarah Crompton, choreographer Crystal Pite discusses the rigour and recklessness in her work, her early career with William Forsythe and how she uses dance as a means to communicate.

This interview was recorded live at an event as part of the Fonteyn Circle, The Royal Ballet, in March 2017, just before the premiere of Pite's Royal Ballet debut, Flight Pattern.

http://www.roh.org.uk/news/crystal-pite-on-rigour-recklessness-and-making-dance-speak

Crystal Pite on rigour, recklessness and making dance speak

The award-winning South African soprano reflects on her musical journey, from learning church hymns with her grandmother to performing on the world's leading opera stages. 

This interview uses extracts from 'Una voce poco fa' from Il barbiere di Siviglia, on Pretty Yende's award-winning debut album A Journey, available on CD http://www.roh.org.uk/products/pretty-yende-a-journey-cd and stream https://sonyclassical.lnk.to/PY-AJourney

Pretty Yende's opera journey: 'Music is a gift to humanity'

Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake (Highlights)

Swan Lake: Act I: Finale: Flight of the Swans

Act 1 - Dance Of The Knights

Create and Dance Nutcracker: March

Create and Dance Nutcracker: Waltz Of The Snowflakes

Create and Dance Nutcracker: The Forest Of Fir Trees

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland: The Mad Hatter's Tea - Party

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland: Prologue

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland: The Queen Of Hearts' Tango

Coppelia 2019-20 Audio Intro - Part 1

Bizet: Carmen (Highlights)

Carmen: Act I: L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, "Habanera" (Carmen)

The Royal Opera House in London's Covent Garden is home to The Royal Opera and The Royal Ballet.

The Royal Ballet and Opera

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