November may be a climatically unpleasant month, but it did inspire this, one of my favorite piano pieces. I turn to “Troika” for a little uplifting or serenity, which we are all bound to need at some point.

“That. Was. Glorious,” a voice behind me gushed when the curtain fell. Indeed, Ainadamar’s genre-fusing combination of great voices, historical elegy, and explosive flamenco is like nothing I’ve ever seen.

Fresh off her critically praised Met debut last spring, Cuban-American soprano Elena Villalón now takes on Golijov’s exhilarating Ainadamar. She kindly took the time to answer some questions in between rehearsals.

Les Contes d’Hoffmann is opera’s equivalent of The Tortured Poets Department, only 14,592 times better. The Met’s revival this season has a smashing lineup of singers.

Erin Morley commands great versatility with her crystal-crisp voice, which sometimes resembles a richly filigreed silver flute, other times the ethereality of a glass harmonica.

My favorite opera scene in film may be the obscurest: Margaret, when Anna Paquin and J. Smith-Cameron see Les Contes d’Hoffmann, with Renée Fleming and Susan Graham.