Classical: First night: Rimsky-Korsakov: The Golden Cockerel

Rimsky-Korsakov's last opera is a biting satire, based on Pushkin. It is a strangely ambiguous work, although the score represents the composer at his most vibrant.

"It's certainly not a fluffy fairy tale by any means, and audiences coming along expecting to get a Russian operatic equivalent to Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker are going to be disappointed," says the opera's designer, Anthony Baker. "The work is a harsh and not very veiled satire on the uses and abuses of power."

At Sadler's Wells, London EC1 (0171-863 8000) from Tue