Puccini: Suor Angelica

With its restrained melancholy and mystical ambience, a concert performance does not diminish the impact of the title heroine and her moving fate. On the contrary, when Kristine Opolais sings Angelica – one of our most exciting young Puccini sopranos (fêted at Covent Garden in Madama Butterfly and in this role) – even a concert hall audience is moved to tears, as we can read in the reviews of her concert performances with the WDR Symphony Orchestra Köln conducted by acclaimed Maestro Andris Nelsons.

“Nelsons draws sensitive responses from the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus but resists the temptation to “go soft” on the story, so that the performance unfolds with inexorable dramatic sweep. Even better, Opolais uses her considerable vocal powers to draw a psychological portrait of formidable insight.” (Financial Times)