Critical Acclaim
Opera Lafayette has been critically-acclaimed since it’s founding in 1994. Review some of our favorite reviews and stories from NPR’s Morning Edition, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Opera News Magazine, and many more below.
Member of the media? For press inquiries, comp tickets, interviews, or imagery please contact Kendra Rubinfeld from KRPR, our publicist on record, via email or by calling 202-681-1151.
2024 HIGHLIGHTS
thalie
Silly pleasures abound in Opera Lafayette’s ‘Les Fêtes de Thalie’ | Review
The Washington Post, May 4, 2024
Opera Lafayette’s French Baroque Gems Enliven Spring on the Upper East Side
Review | The Observer, May 15, 2024
Les Fêtes de Thalie’ Reviews | Review
The Wall Street Journal, May 14, 2024
Opera Lafayette unearths another charming find in Mouret opéra-ballet | Review
Washington Classical Review, May 4, 2024
Sumptuous music in Opera Lafayette’s ‘Les Fêtes de Thalie’ at Kennedy Center Review | DCTA, May 4, 2024
Opera Lafayette's Les Fêtes de Thalie: Entertainments Without Sadness | Review
Opera Gene, May 4, 2024
Opera Lafayette’s Merriment of the Comedic Muse | Review
The Scene4, May 4, 2024
Comedy Night! | Review
Voce di Meche, May 8, 2024
Opera Lafayette’s Les Fetes de Thalie | Review
Berkshire Fine Art, May 14, 2024
ESTHER
Opera Lafayette serves ‘Esther’ two ways at the Kennedy Center | Review
The Washington Post, February 9, 2024
The best of Baroque times with Opera Lafayette’s tale of two Esthers | Review
New York Classical Review, May 10, 2024
“From Saint-Cyr to Cannons…Theater as Mass Media” | Review
Opera Gene, February 12, 2024
Two Esthers | Review
Voce di Meche, May 11, 2024
MorgIAne (upcoming season)
OperaCréole and Opera Lafayette Featured on NBC Nightly News | Feature Story
NBC Nightly News, February 5, 2024
New Orleans OperaCréole restores lost works of Black composers | Feature Story
TODAY, February 22, 2024
2023 HIGHLIGHTS
COUPERIN
Opera Lafayette's Couperin le Grand: Time Travel, First Class | Review
Michael Rogers, Opera Gene, October 27, 2023
Opera Lafayette enters new era by reaffirming French baroque focus | Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, October 26, 2023
This Fall there’s more classical music than you can shake a baton at | Preview
Michael Brodeur, The Washington Post, August 7, 2023
Io
Opera Lafayette gives fresh bite to French Baroque in eye-popping Io | Review
Michael Brodeur, The Washington Post, May 4, 2023
A Forgotten Opera Premieres 280 Years Late | Story
Olivia Hampton, NPR’s Morning Edition, May 3, 2023
Rameau's Io Gets Its World Premiere with Opera Lafayette | Article
James Jacobs, WETA, April 26, 2023
Machine Dazzle Shares His Singular Vision for Life, Art, and Adorning the Gods in Opera Lafayette’s Io | Cover Story
Andre Hereford, April 20, 2023
2022 Highlights
GRÉTRY
“Opera Lafayette’s Silvain: Pretty Music Yes, But More” | Read Review
Richard Beams, Opera Gene, June 5, 2022
“Opera Lafayette Revives a Grétry Comic Opera, with a Charming American Twist | Read Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, June 3, 2022
2021 Highlights
THE BLACKSMITH (Wolf trap)
“Opera Lafayette returns with Westernized retooling of a French Baroque comedy” | Read Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, September 10, 2021
2019-2020 Highlights
THE BLACKSMITH (Mancos, colorado)
“Opera Lafayette Presents The Blacksmith to Live Audiences at Reddert Ranch” | Read Full Article
Leah Borts-Kuperman, Opera Canada, October 7, 2020
“Opera Lafayette takes a French comic classic to the Old West” | Read Full Article
Whitney Fishburn, DC Metro Theatre Arts, November 12, 2020
“Opéra Comique Puts on a Cowboy Hat” | Read Full Article
Michael Rogers, Opera Gene, November 12, 2020
“How Opera is Helping Mend Fences in a Small Mountain Town” | Listen
Docu-Mental, November 13, 2020
2019-2020 Highlights
lenore
“The appeal of Leonore” | Read Full Article (English)
Yvan Beuvard, Opéra Forum, March 29, 2021
“A thoroughly enjoyable performance: a rarity these days.” | Read Full Review
Gary Shengold, Gay City News, March 4, 2020
“Sitting Down with Opera Lafayette’s Ryan Brown” | Read Full Article
Michael Rogers, Opera Gene, February 13, 2020
“Opera Lafayette Marks Milestone With Beethoven’s Leonore” | Read Full Article
Patrick McCoy, Early Music America, February 24, 2020
2017-2018 Highlights
Visitors to Versailles
"Reinhold’s voice blossomed in an extraordinary way" | Read Full Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, May 3, 2018
Scarlatti | Geminiani
"So enterprising that you applaud the idea as much as the achievement." | Read Full Review
Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times, February 4, 2018
"Opera Lafayette’s double-bill delivers a striking cross-cultural success." | Read Full Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, January 31, 2018
"Ryan Brown led a lively performance on period instruments and deserves kudos for dreaming up a way for audiences to enjoy these unique pieces together." | Read Full Review
Joanne Lessner, Opera News, February 2, 2018
An Evening of Monteverdi
"An evening of exceptional music-making." | Read Full Review
Charles Downey, Washington Classical Review, October 25, 2017
"The lovely Ms. Redpath showed her vulnerable side in "Lamento della ninfa" with three male voices (Mr. Kilbride, baritone David Newman, and bass Alex Rosen) serving as a Greek chorus commenting on her fate. The performance of Guest Musical Director Thomas Dunford on the archlute was particularly fine here, adding to the sonorities. " | Read Full Review
Meche Kroop, Voce di Meche, October 26, 2017
2016-2017 Highlights
Les Indes Galantes - Part IV
"Opera Lafayette brings before us baroque works from France, always cast with exceptional singers." | Read Full Review
Meche Kroop, Voce di Meche, June 3, 2017
"It was a wonderfully concise program that revealed a great deal of diversity within a single piece of opera. It was a well performed and well directed night of music." | Read Full Review
Elle Marie Sullivan, Maryland Theatre Guide, June 4, 2017
Léonore, ou l’amour conjugal
"The event was uncommonly rewarding" | Read Full Review
Musical America Worldwide, February 27, 2016
"Where in North America can you see 17th- and 18th-century French comic opera featuring an all French-Canadian cast? The unlikely answer is Washington, DC. The city’s company Opera Lafayette (OL) has been performing obscure French Baroque opera for 17 years." | Full Article
La Scena Musicale, February/March Issue
"Why does Opera Lafayette from Washington, DC come up to Montreal for rehearsals of its new production?" French Version | English Translation
Le Devoir, January 27, 2017
Opera Lafayette Season Review
"Opera Lafayette is the third opera company I follow consistently... Opera America cites it as an outstanding company in
Washington and one of the best in the country... Ryan Brown makes his home in our city... and his company should be considered a national treasure." | Read Full Review
Susan Galbraith, DC Theatre Scene, August 2016
2015-2016 highlights:
Recording - PHILIDOR: Les Femmes Vengées
"Opera Lafayette’s young cast ... sing with clean, stylish vocalism and manage the comedy capably. But it’s Ryan Brown’s orchestra that steals the show, playing with rich contrasts, clarity and verve." | Read Full Review
Opera News Magazine, February 2016
Une Éducation Manquée
"Emmanuel Chabrier’s Une Éducation Manquée (An Incomplete Education),” a half-hour work for piano and three singers, written in 1879 for a single performance in a club. Opera Lafayette brought this piece, as light and fleeting and swirling with color as a soap bubble, to the Terrace Theater on Tuesday and Wednesday night." | Read Full Review
Anne Midgette, The Washington Post, February 3,2016
"Soprano Sophie Junker was a wide-eyed Hélène, with ... a beautiful overall tone, with soprano Amel Brahim-Djelloul ... showing a charming boyishness in the trouser role of Gontran. Baritone Dominique Côté had smart comic timing as Pausanias.” | Read Full Review
Charles Downey, Ionarts, February 4, 2016
Catone in Utica
"Emilia, sung splendidly by the young mezzo-soprano Julia Dawson, lurked in the background through most of the first half, like everyone’s bad conscience, but suddenly turned into a spitfire before intermission, vowing to avenge her husband’s death. As Caesar, Mr. Holiday, a robust and brilliant countertenor, had similar animated opportunities and made the most of them. As Cato, Mr. Allen, a strong veteran tenor, took his wrath out harrowingly on Marzia, his daughter, having learned of her secret love for Caesar. Anna Reinhold, a mezzo-soprano, sang Marzia beautifully, and Marguerite Krull was effective in the thankless trouser role of Arbace, Marzia’s would-be lover. (Don’t you hate it when a Caesar gets in your way?) Eric Jurenas, another powerful and pliant countertenor, sang Fulvio, Caesar’s aide." | Read Full Review
James Oestreich, The New York Times, December 2, 2015
"Brown is not a conductor who imposes himself on the music. He simply is the music, and his musicians follow him with a unanimity that is a joy to watch...[he] has the ability to discern which particular details of shape and texture will most vividly characterize a mood, throwing open the doors to great variety in his music-making." | Read Full Review
Patrick Rucker, The Washington Post, November 29, 2015