Without notice or fanfare the COC season announcement landed in my email inbox at 11.30 this morning.  I kind of miss the old 10am press conference which at least offered an opportunity to ask about the rationale of some of the decisions.  I guess though that the number of people writing about opera in Toronto these days would fit in a phone box so maybe it’s too much to hope for.  There are some mildly surprising aspects to the announcement.  There’s no Mozart or Puccini nor, more consequential, any sign of the various new opera projects that COC has/had under development which do have a bit of a habit of disappearing without trace.  There’s also no “second stage” production.  I guess that experiment is done.  So it’s six main stage productions in the traditional three pairs.

In the fall we get Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette (7 performances; September 27th to October 18th).  It’s an Amy Lane production from Malmö.  Described as set in “gilded age” New York, let’s hope it’s as good as her Faust.  Bekhzod Davronov and Kseniia Proshina are the lovers with some rather more familiar faces in the rest of the cast including a welcome COC return for Bob Pomakov as Frère Laurent.  Also featuring are Gordon Bintner, Megan Latham, Korin Scott-Thomas, Owen McCausland and the Alexes Halliday and Hetherington.  Yves Abel conducts.

It’s paired with a revival of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice (7 performances, October 9th to 25th)  It’s the Robert Carsen production previously seen at the COC in 2011.  This time Christophe Gayral directs.  Iestyn Davies sings Orfeo (yea!) and Anne-Sophie Neher returns to the COC as Euridice (also yea!).  Bernard Labadie conducts.

Gloomy winter kicks off appropriately enough with Christopher Alden’s dark claustrophobic productoon of Verdi’s Rigoletto (seven performances, January 24th to February 14th).  This was last seen at the COC in 2018.  This time around it features the excellent Quinn Kelsey, last seen at the COC ten years ago in La Traviata, in the title role with Ben Bliss as the Duke of Mantua and Andrea Carroll as Gilda.  Johannes Debus conducts.

The second winter show is also a revival.  It’s the Els Comediants production of Rossini’s The Barber of Seville last seen in 2020 (8 performances, February 5th to 21st).  The most interesting casting is Montreal’s Deepa Johnny as Rosina.  We also get Luke Sutliff as Figaro and Dave Monaco as Almaviva, Luca Pisaroni as Basilio and Renato Girolami as Bartolo.  Daniela Candillari makes her COC conducting debut.  I wonder if she will be as exciting as Speranza Scappucci.

If April is the cruellest month then a revival of the Robert Lepage double bill of Bartók’s Bluebeards Castle and Schoenberg’s Erwartung (7 performances,  April 25th to May 16th) seems appropriate.  This is a 1993 production last seen at the COC in 2015 when it was also revival directed by François Racine.  This time around the weird Hungarians are sung by Christian Van Horn and Karen Cargill with Anna Gabler as the anonymous woman in the Schoenberg.  Johannes Debus conducts.

Spring also brings Massenet’s Werther (seven performances, May 7th to 23rd).  It’s a new co-pro with Montréal and Vancouver (spot a trend here?) directed by Alain Gauthier.  Russell Thomas and Victoria Karkacheva play Werther and Charlotte with a supporting cast of Canadians including Gordon Bintner, Simone Osborne, Alain Coulombe, Bob Pomakov and Michael Colvin.  Johannes Debus also conducts this one so he’s going to have a busy spring.

All in all it’s a pretty balanced season and once more we get the stripped back 43 performances but this with no second stage show and no Ensemble Studio production.  Clearly times are still hard!