But as a fully-staged piece, as The Grange Festival’s director Michael Chance reminded us after Saturday’s performance, Handel’s story of the fall of Babylon, the triumph of the Persian leader Cyrus, ...

Handel is now best known for his mighty oratorios. ‘Tis the season for Messiah. But he was late to that game, deep as he was into Italian opera, the blockbuster genre of the 18 th century and the one ...

After a deeply moving, finely sung Le nozze di Figaro and a gloriously staged, superbly cast Falstaff, this production of one of Handel’s finest oratorios confirms The Grange Festival as the star of ...

With stage directions written into its original libretto, Belshazzar (four stars) has the reputation of being the most overtly theatrical of Handel’s oratorios. Yet its first 90 minutes seems ...

Rupert Christiansen was the opera critic and arts features writer for The Telegraph between 1995 and 2020. He is the author of several books of cultural history including Romantic Affinities, Paris ...

Opera: Puccini’s La Boheme and Handel’s Belshazzar THE LAST place you would expect to find opera is at the Cock Tavern, a boozer in Kilburn High Road, north London.

Which is a shame, because it’s a rare delight these days to see Christie perform in London with the group that played such an important part in reviving the fortunes of the early music movement. While ...