English Touring Opera current debut manufacturing of Gilbert And Sullivan’s The Gondoliers alongside Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci for Spring 2026
New opera for kids – Ada and the Code Crusaders – to succeed in hundreds of scholars throughout the nation
Visiting: Sheffield, Cheltenham, London, Buxton, Norwich, Chester, Canterbury, Cambridge, Truro, and Durham from 20 March – 21 Could 2026
English Touring Opera (ETO) announce additional particulars for its Spring 2026 tour, which opens in Sheffield for the primary time as the corporate continues to deepen roots within the metropolis. That includes two model new productions – the corporate’s first ever manufacturing of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Gondoliers and a brand new English translation of Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci – in addition to a brand new opera for kids, the tour will convey opera to hundreds of individuals throughout the nation. The nation’s main touring opera firm, ETO brings excellent dwell productions and impactful training and neighborhood tasks to extra cities and cities than every other UK opera firm in its mission to make distinctive inventive experiences accessible to all.
The tour opens with Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Gondoliers at Sheffield’s Lyceum Theatre on Friday 20 March. Thought of Gilbert and Sullivan’s final nice success, The Gondoliers is a fizzing comedy of mistaken identification that marries pleasure and chaos with a pointy satire of monarchy and sophistication. Robin Bailey and Samuel Pantcheff sing the roles of gondoliers Marco and Giuseppe, with Phil Wilcox – a stalwart of many current ETO productions and its operas for kids – because the Duke of Plaza-Toro. Mezzo-soprano Lauren Younger, acclaimed for her appearances in ETO’s The Rake’s Progress and Cinderella, additionally returns to the corporate to sing the function of the Duchess of Plaza-Toro. Natasha Agarwal sings Gianetta in her first principal function for the corporate, with Beth Moxon as Tessa; the forged is accomplished by George Robarts (Luiz), Kelli-Ann Masterson (Casilda) and Matthew Siveter (Don Alhambra del Bolero).
Director and choreographer Liam Metal returns to the corporate to direct the manufacturing, following 2017’s critically acclaimed Persistence and Olivier-Award successful Paul Bunyan in 2014, presenting a technicolour imaginative and prescient of eighteenth-century Venice filled with motion and vitality. Becoming a member of him to helm the manufacturing is conductor Jack Ridley.
The tour additionally includes a new manufacturing of Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci, in a brand new English translation by ETO Creative Director Robin Norton-Hale. Ripped from the headlines a few real-life crime case from the composer’s personal childhood, Pagliacci is the story of the very public breakdown of a passionate relationship between two celebrated actors in an intense 90 minutes of drama. Soprano Paula Sides – who sung the title function within the firm’s 2023 manufacturing of Lucrezia Borgia – returns to ETO within the function of Nedda, joined by tenor Ronald Samm as Canio, a job he lately carried out to important acclaim at West Inexperienced Home Opera. Baritones Phillip Rhodes and Danny Shelvey make their ETO debuts within the roles of Tonio and Silvio respectively, and tenor Harry Grigg sings the function of Beppe in his principal function debut with the corporate.
Eleanor Burke – founding father of groundbreaking sustainable opera firm Inexperienced Opera and graduate of the Royal Ballet and Opera’s Jette Parker Programme – makes her ETO directorial debut with Pagliacci, which explores the darkish facet of fame and obsessive love in a manufacturing impressed by the connection of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. ETO Music Director Gerry Cornelius conducts, whereas Michael Pavelka (Set Designer), Laura Jane Stanfield (Costume Designer) and Zeynep Kepekli (Lighting Designer) will work throughout each productions.
This spring, ETO can even be working with the pioneering Streetwise Opera on their bold undertaking for subsequent 12 months, Reimagining the Classics. At its coronary heart, the undertaking invitations audiences to expertise opera via a brand new lens, seeing acquainted tales which have been reimagined to reply to society’s ever-changing panorama. Streetwise performers will work with composers and ETO’s orchestral musicians to create a daring new piece of music impressed by Pagliacci, which shall be carried out onstage at Hackney Empire earlier than ETO’s efficiency on 10 April.
Studying and Participation: ETO’s award-winning Studying and Participation programme is central to the corporate’s mission and reaches over 10,000 folks every year via productions and tasks in theatres, faculties, museums and libraries. ETO lately partnered with Laidlaw Opera Belief to broaden its programme and to convey opera to extra folks than ever earlier than. This features a fee of a brand new opera for kids, Ada and the Code Crusaders, which shall be carried out in over 25 main faculties to greater than 5000 kids. Written and composed by the award-winning Anna Pool, Ada and the Code Crusaders takes kids on a historic and scientific journey that explores the life and genius of English mathematician and author Ada Lovelace. Directed by Nel Crouch, the manufacturing stars many singers from the principle Spring productions together with Natasha Agarwal, Phil Wilcox, Rebecca Milford, Judy Louie Brown, Beth Moxon, John Ieuan Jones and Wonsick Oh.
Along with work in main faculties, ETO’s Studying and Participation programme additionally consists of ETO Carry out, its opera workshop programme for Key Stage Three and GCSE Music college students which provides younger folks the possibility to write down and stage their very own operas, relationships with associate faculties and bespoke tasks for Different Provision settings. Extra info on ETO’s partnership with Laidlaw Opera Belief may be discovered right here.
Robin Norton-Hale, CEO and Creative Director of English Touring Opera, mentioned: ‘This Spring we’re delighted to enter a contemporary chapter in ETO’s historical past as we open our first season in our new residence metropolis of Sheffield. This can be a fantastic alternative for us to announce ourselves as a everlasting fixture of Sheffield’s wealthy cultural neighborhood whereas persevering with to ship top quality and accessible opera to as many individuals and locations as attainable. That includes premieres of two vastly widespread and contrasting operas and a brand new fee for kids based mostly on the lifetime of Ada Lovelace, this actually is a season to point out that opera is an artform with one thing to supply everybody.’
ETO’s Spring tour begins on Friday 20 March with The Gondoliers, with Pagliacci following on Saturday 21 March, with each productions touring till late Could.
Extra info and tickets may be discovered on right here.
