Los Angeles Opera has announced its 2025-26 season, which features five mainstage productions, plus a starry lineup of recitals and special events.
Kicking off the season September 20 will be West Side Story, starring soprano Gabriella Reyes and tenor Duke Kim. The co-production with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, and the Glimmerglass Festival, is directed by Francesca Zambello (The Little Mermaid). James Conlon will conduct the iconic score by Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim, which has made the Broadway musical one of a select few to become an opera house staple.
Next up will be a revival of Puccini's La Bohème, led by LA Opera resident conductor Lina González-Granados. Soprano Janai Brugger and tenor Oreste Cosimo star as Mimi and Rodolfo, with soprano Erica Petrocelli as Musetta, baritones Gihoon Kim and Emmett O'Hanion as Marcello as Schaunard, and bass William Guanbo Su as Colline.
Phelim McDermott's production of Philip Glass' Akhnaten will receive a revival in February, starring countertenor John Holiday as the titular Egyptian Pharaoh, who shook the political structure of the New Kingdom by instituting a new state religion. The cast also includes mezzo-soprano Sun-Ly Pierce as Nefertiti, soprano So Young Park as the dowager Queen Tye, and Grammy-winning bass-baritone Zachary James (Hadestown, The Addams Family) as Amenhotep III, reprising his role from previous mountings of the production at English National Opera and the Metropolitan Opera. Dalia Stasevska will conduct.
On the more humorous side of things, Verdi's final opera Falstaff, based on Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor, will take the stage in April. Baritone Craig Colclough stars as Sir John Falstaff, the braggadocious knight of Shakespeare's Henriad, as he attempts to woo and wheedle two wealthy wives, Mistress Ford—played by soprano Nicole Heaston—and Mistress Page. Baritone Ernesto Petti plays Master Ford, the jealous husband, with soprano Deanna Breiwick as Nannetta, the Fords' daughter. Tenor Anthony León as Fenton and mezzo-soprano Hyona Kim as Mistress Quickly round out the principal cast.
The final opera in the season will be Mozart's The Magic Flute, presented in Barrie Kosky's acclaimed production in which the singers are augmented by projected expressionist illustrations. Tenor Miles Mykkanen stars as the prince Tamino, who is sent on a mission by the Queen of the Night (soprano Aigul Khismatulina) to rescue her daughter Pamina (soprano Sydney Mancasola) from the clutches of the sorcerer Sarastro (bass Kwangchul Youn). Baritone Kyle Miller tags along as Papageno, the hapless bird-catcher who becomes Tamino's reluctant sidekick, and tenor Zhengyi Bai completes the cast as Monostatos.
The LA Opera season will also feature a number of recitals from some of opera's most in-demand vocalists, including Ben Bliss, Juan Diego Flórez, Nadine Sierra, and Renée Fleming. Broadway legend Patti LuPone will also make an appearance, bringing her cabaret show Matters of the Heart to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion February 21. Other performances will include Sarah Kirkland Snider's chamber opera Hildegard, inspired by the life and writings of 12th-century composer Hildegard von Bingen; and a screening of the 1925 silent film The Phantom of the Opera with live orchestral accompaniment.
Noticeably absent from the season is Missy Mazzoli's Lincoln in the Bardo, which had been previously planned to have its world premiere at the company in the coming season before coming to the Metropolitan Opera the following year. This is the second season in a row that LA Opera has cancelled a pre-Met production, after deferring Mason Bates' The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay last year. As with Kavalier & Clay, an additional workshop of the new opera will be scheduled in place of the LA Opera production, per the AP, with details to be announced.
To see the complete season, and ticketing information, visit LAOpera.org.
