“No glare is more searing in the operatic world than that which beats down on the opera Norma… The title character’s music is early 19th-century bel canto – great stuff – with vocal lines as intricately woven as lace. The soprano/mezzo-soprano duets can be especially thrilling. None of this, however, quite explains why the opera’s infrequent productions are greeted with such profound reverence and reality-defying expectation.”