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Choose from a selection of opera's biggest hits, gathered from World of Opera's featured productions.
Mozart's astonishing dramma giocoso — literally, "playful drama" — succeeds on so many different levels that nearly every new production reveals something previously unheard, or unappreciated. This one presents a first-rate cast, from a truly historic operatic venue.
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Strauss' lurid yet sumptuous one-act opera tells the story of Elektra and her decidedly dysfunctional family — her murdered father Agamemnon, her frantic sister Chrysothemis and their homicidal mother, Klytaemnestra. The production is from the Washington National Opera.
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In Dvorak's dream-like opera, a little mermaid abandons immortality for love, but her ultimate sacrifice goes unrewarded. Soprano Ana Maria Martinez stars as Rusalka in a production from the 2009 Glyndebourne Festival.
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Massenet's Werther is thrilling, tuneful and one of the saddest operas ever composed, ending with a suicide on Christmas Eve. Tenor Rolando Villazon stars in the title role, in a production from the Paris National Opera.
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Written during the final year of Mozart's life, The Magic Flute presents a magical world of surreal characters and mysterious rites, and the composer filled it with Masonic symbols and allegory.
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