Opera North’s exuberant new season is a perfect marriage of drama and comedy, bringing three contrasting operas to life on stage in Leeds and on tour throughout the North of England this Autumn.

The season includes the world’s most popular romantic opera, a beautiful and chilling Baroque music drama, and a high-spirited Czech comedy. All three operas together explore the price of love and lust, through the cost of pursuing romantic relationships which break social and moral codes.

The title of Verdi’s La traviata, which can be translated as ‘The Fallen Woman,’ refers to the lead character, Violetta. A celebrated courtesan to the rich, she falls in love with one of her admirers. But the scandal of their relationship, and Violetta’s failing health, means she is soon forced to sacrifice what may be her only chance of real love.

The adulterous relationship which drives the action of one of the earliest operas, The Coronation of Poppea, comes at a high moral cost, as the ambitious Poppea and the brutal emperor Nero scheme to overcome their enemies with numerous lives at stake. Meanwhile, the light-hearted comedy of Smetana’s The Bartered Bride is filled with youthful freshness, as the young couple Ma?enka and Jeník attempt to outsmart the plans of the local marriage broker.