This page is also available in / Cette page est également disponible en:
Français (French)
As opera companies continue to navigate the challenges of skyrocketing costs and audience retention, most Canadian organizations are opting to program well-known titles in 2025-26. Here’s a season rundown from west to east.
Pacific Opera Victoria
Meghan Lindsay
Artistic Director Brenna Corner presents a season in keeping with POV’s always-careful mix of repertoire stalwarts and less-usual fare. October brings a new production of Britten’s The Turn of the Screw staged by Canadian theatre director Michael Shamata, with a stellar Canadian cast including Kirsten MacKinnon, Isaiah Bell, Jonelle Sills and Catherine Daniel. In February, Corner herself stages Puccini’s Tosca with a role-debuting Meghan Lindsay and baritone Brett Polegato’s first Canadian Scarpia. April ushers in an intriguing Orpheus and Eurydice by Gluck with a strong team of Canadian women at the helm: Conductor Nicole Paiement, Director Amanda Testini and singers Andriana Chuchman and Suzanne Rigden. www.pacificopera.ca
Vancouver Opera
Jonelle Sills
The company’s October season-opener is Verdi’s Rigoletto in the Glynis Leyshon staging that premiered last season in Victoria. American baritone Michael Chioldi sings the title role with Canadian soprano Sarah Dufresne as Gilda and Chinese tenor Yongzhao Yu as the Duke. February brings Mozart’s Così fan tutte directed by Rob Herriot featuring an all-Canadian cast including Tracy Dahl, Daniel Okulitch, Jamie Groote and Owen McCausland. The season closes in April with Puccini’s La bohème with sopranos Jonelle Sills and Lucia Cesaroni alternating as Mimì, Italian tenor Ivan Magrì as Rodolfo, Lara Ciekiewicz as Musetta and Gregory Dahl as Marcello. www.vancouveropera.ca
Calgary Opera
Matthew White. Photo: Just Jami Photography
Calgary Opera offers a season of repertoire staples, starting with Puccini’s Madama Butterfly in November. The international cast includes Japanese soprano Yasko Sato in the title role, American tenor Matthew White as Pinkerton, American mezzo Nina Yoshida Nelsen as Suzuki and Canadian baritone Phillip Addis as Sharpless. The Old Trout Puppet Workshop and Director Brenna Corner bring their 2016 Vancouver Opera production of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel to Calgary in January. Canadians Carolyn Sproule and Simone Osborne sing the title roles. Rossini’s The Barber of Seville closes the season in April with Armenian baritone Grisha Martirosyan in the title role, South African mezzo-soprano Siphokazi Molteno as Rosina, and Canadian tenor John Tessier as Almaviva. www.calgaryopera.com
Edmonton Opera
Marion Newman
The company is an outlier in a national context with its embrace of a non-traditional season. Things open in October with Bravi!, a gala concert at the acoustically-superb Winspear Centre, featuring Zachary Rioux, Miriam Khalil and Tessa Fackelmann. February brings the first full production of Ian Cusson and Royce Vavrek’s Indians on Vacation starring a host of Indigenous talent including Marion Newman, Grant Youngblood, Julie Lumsden and Evan Korbut. The company’s presentation of Wagner’s Ring Cycle continues in June with Siegfried in Jonathan Dove’s reduced score. Samuel Levine sings the title role with John Tessier as Mime, Neil Craighead as the Wanderer, Dion Mazerolle as Alberich and Jaclyn Grossman as Brünnhilde. www.edmontonopera.com
Manitoba Opera
Caitlin Wood
The company’s November season-opener is Puccini’s Tosca. American soprano Marina Costa-Jackson takes on the title role with veteran Canadians tenor David Pomeroy and baritone Gregory Dahl as Cavaradossi and Scarpia. April ushers in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro with a Canadian-forward cast including Jamie Groote’s Countess, Phillip Addis’s Count, Caitlin Wood’s Susanna and American baritone Robert Mellon as Figaro. www.mbopera.ca
Canadian Opera Company
Iestyn Davies
As Canada’s largest opera company continues its search for a new general director, 2025-26 is a careful mix of in-house revivals, and the somewhat surprising offering of new productions of two French operas long absent from its repertoire. Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette opens the season in September in a new staging by Amy Lane, who directed last season’s Faust. American tenor Stephen Costello and Russian soprano Kseniia Proshina sing the title roles. The Gounod runs in repertoire with a revival of Robert Carsen’s production of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice with British countertenor Iestyn Davies and Canadian soprano Anna-Sophie Neher in the title roles.
Quinn Kelsey. Photo: Dario Acosta
The company’s third showing of Christopher Alden’s Victorian men’s-club setting of Verdi’s Rigoletto opens in January with three American stars: Quinn Kelsey as Rigoletto, Andrea Carroll as Gilda, and Ben Bliss as the Duke. It runs in repertoire with another revival, Rossini’s The Barber of Seville which returns in Spanish theatre troupe Els Comediants’ commedia setting. American baritone Luke Sutliff is the Barber, with debuting Canadian mezzo Deepa Johnny as Rosina and Italian tenor Dave Monaco as Almaviva.
Victoria Karkacheva. Photo: Yana Gergova
Robert Lepage’s iconic production of Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Schoenberg’s Erwartung returns in April with Christian Van Horn and Karen Cargill as Bluebeard and Judith, and Anna Gabler as the Woman. May brings Massenet’s Werther for the first time in 30 years, in a new co-production with Opéra de Montréal and Vancouver Opera. Alain Gauthier directs an international cast including American tenor Russell Thomas as Werther, Russian mezzo Victoria Karkacheva as Charlotte and Canadians soprano Simone Osborne and bass-baritone Gordon Bintner as Sophie and Albert. www.coc.ca
Voicebox: Opera in Concert
Colin Ainsworth. Photo: Bo Huang
Following its first successful season in its new venue, the group returns to the acoustically-superb Jeanne Lamon Hall at Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre with another trio of less-than-usually-performed operas. The season opens on Nov. 16 with Richard Cœur-de-lion by André Grétry, an opéra comique that dramatizes the legendary rescue of King Richard the Lionheart by his loyal squire and troubadour, Blondel de Nesle. Tenor Colin Ainsworth stars in the title role (Nov. 15). Bellini’s lyric masterpiece La sonnambula charts the borderline tragic tale of Amina, a young woman prone to sleepwalking, that nevertheless ends happily (Feb. 14). The season closes on March 21 with Kurt Weill’s Lost in the Stars. Adapted from Alan Paton’s novel Cry, the Beloved Country, it explores the impact of racial injustice and personal tragedy in South Africa during apartheid. www.operainconcert.com
Opéra de Montréal
John Brancy
Opéra de Montréal launches its season with Mozart’s Don Giovanni staged by veteran British director Stephen Lawless and a cast highlighting former Atelier Lyrique artists Kirsten LeBlanc, Andrea Núñez, Sophie Naubert and Matthew Li. American baritone John Brancy sings the title role.
Mireille Lebel. Photo: Pierre-Étienne Bergeron
November brings Atom Egoyan’s 2017 Pacific Opera Victoria production of Janáček’s Jenůfa with French soprano Marie-Adeline Henry in the title role, Swedish mezzo Katarina Karnéus as Kostelnička, Lithuanian tenor Edgaras Montvidas as Laca and Canadian tenor Isaiah Bell as Števa. January marks the world premiere of Ana Sokolović’s Clown(s), a work inspired by the worlds of Sand, Fellini, Chaplin, and Keaton. The all-Canadian cast features Aline Kutan, Mireille Lebel, Andrew Haji and Bruno Roy.
Rihab Chaieb
The season closes in May with Bizet’s Carmen in a production from Edmonton Opera directed by Anna Theodosakis. Rihab Chaieb sings Carmen, with Arturo Chacón-Cruz as Don José, Magali Simard-Galdès as Micaëla, and Ethan Vincent as Escamillo. www.operademontreal.com
Opéra de Québec
Elisabeth Boudreault
After the sudden departure of General and Artistic Director Jean-François Lapointe in January, the company presents what is presumably still his program, as it temporarily operates under its former head, Grégoire Legendre. October sees Rossini’s La Cenerentola for the first time in almost 30 years with American mezzo Camille Sherman in the title role and Anglo-Irish tenor Joseph Doody as Prince Ramiro. Director Véronika Makdissi-Warren promises a fashionista take. May marks the return of Puccini’s La bohème, with Clemens Schuldt leading his own Orchestre symphonique de Québec in the pit. French singers Julien Dran and Alexandra Marcellier sing Rodolfo and Mimì with Canadians Elisabeth Boudreault and Hugo Laporte as Musetta and Marcello. www.operadequebec.com
This page is also available in / Cette page est également disponible en:
Français (French)
