Now, neither classics nor philology is what it used to be. And the combination—classical philology—is in evident trouble. The ...

On a new production of Wagner’s Die Walküre, at the Bavarian State Opera. Kratzer studied philosophy as well as set design. He is well-versed in how to imbue opera productions with meaning even in ...

The Sun Valley Music Festival in Idaho is part of a constellation of prominent festivals that dot the Rocky Mountains’ ski towns each summer. I dropped in on the forty-second season to hear a ...

Victor Davis Hanson is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author of The Second World Wars (Basic Books). He was The New Criterion ’s Visiting Critic for the ...

Each week the editors of The New Criterion offer recommendations on what to read, see, and hear in the world of culture in the weekly Critic’s Notebook. To get it first, subscribe to the free Critic’s ...

You’ve heard of the gardens of Versailles, but what about those of Méréville? For Apollo, Gabriel Wick takes a look at the history of the eighteenth-century garden designed in 1785 for Jean-Joseph, ...

“I want to be alone,” said Greta Garbo. Martha Argerich is the opposite. The legendary pianist is seldom to be heard in solo recital these days. She prefers to play with others—in chamber music and ...

This summer, the Salzburg Festival is staging Ariadne auf Naxos, Richard Strauss’s opera from 1912. The festival is staging it in the House for Mozart, formerly known as the Little Festival Hall. It ...

When a lady took her seat in the Great Festival Hall at the Salzburg Festival on Sunday night, she said, “This is a dream come true.” She had come from about 10,000 miles away—Tasmania. She, along ...

Modern or traditional? This dichotomy continually presents a challenge to the operatic world as it seeks new ways to freshen up old favorites. The Bavarian State Opera’s summer festival, which ran ...

As you approach the Munch museum in Oslo, you realize one possible meaning of The Scream (first version, 1893): it is a response to modern architects who have been given huge sums of money to do their ...