Welsh National Opera announces further details and casting for Autumn 2025 Season
28 July 2025Welsh National Opera announces further details and casting for Autumn 2025 Season
- Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw returns to sing the lead role in Tosca
- Welsh actress Rakie Ayola joins Candide cast in her first opera role
- WNO Orchestra and Chorus come together for A Night at the Opera
Tosca
Welsh National Opera’s Autumn Season opens with a new production of Puccini’s Tosca, with Edward Dick making his Welsh National Opera directorial debut with the production he originally directed at Opera North in 2018.
Quickly becoming one of the world’s leading Toscas, Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw returns to WNO after her critically acclaimed performance in the Autumn 2024 production of Il trittico to sing the lead role. She will be joined by Andrés Presno who returns to WNO to sing Cavaradossi and Dario Solari as Scarpia. The cast also includes WNO’s new Associate Artists Owain Rowlands as Jailer and Ross Fettes as The Sacristan (Verger), Alun Rhys-Jenkins as Spoletta and George Newton-Fitzgerald as Sciarrone.
Hungarian conductor Gergely Madaras also makes his WNO debut to conduct Puccini’s unforgettable score including the spine-tingling aria Te deum and the hauntingly beautiful Vissi d’arte.
Puccini’s production is full of passion, power and deceit, and this new modern production continues to bring to life this thrilling story of love, lust, murder and corruption which has become one of the best-loved operas.
Tosca will open in Cardiff on Sunday 14 September before touring to Southampton, Llandudno and Bristol.
Director Edward Dick said:
‘When you think about opera you think about Tosca. It’s one of the most essentially operatic pieces in the repertoire, an epic rollercoaster of a score in which politics, sex and religion collide. Puccini’s music mainlines emotion into the audience, and our aim was to create a production that’s as dramatic and emotionally direct as the score, an urgent political thriller that sweeps the audience off its feet and has a lot to say about the world in which we live now. I’m very much looking forward to revisiting this production with WNO. One of the things I’m most proud of is how directly it connects to audiences who are new to opera. If you enjoy an action thriller, I think you’ll love this.’
Candide
Following its WNO premiere in June 2023, Leonard Berstein’s celebrated production of Candide returns to Cardiff’s Wales Millennium Centre in September alongside Tosca. The original production team reunite, led by director James Bonas.
New to the cast and making her WNO debut is award winning Welsh actress Rakie Ayola, who will perform the role of Narrator/Pangloss/Sage/Beggar. As well as being a critically acclaimed actress, Rakie is a producer, and grew up in the Ely district of Cardiff. Her career spans 36 years and she is a graduate and Fellow of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. Her recent work includes playing Persephone in Netflix series Kaos; starring in The Pact Season 2 for which she won 2023 Bafta Cymru Best Actress; TV film Anthony for which she won 2021 Bafta Best Supporting Actress; appearing opposite fellow Welsh actor Rhys Ifans in Ed Thomas’ play On Bear Ridge and starring alongside Saoirse Ronan in upcoming feature film Bad Apples from Pulse Films for Paramount, directed by Jonatan Etzler.
Costume designs are by Nathalie Pallandre, with sets by Thibault Vancraenenbroeck, choreography by Ewan Jones and the striking video and animation designs are by Grégoire Pont. This time the opera is conducted by American conductor Ryan McAdams who makes his WNO mainscale debut.
This critically acclaimed WNO production brings 18th-century France colliding with 20th-century post-war America, pulling together Broadway, operetta and the satire of Voltaire’s original novella whilst combining the brilliance of Bernstein’s music.
The ingenious animation creates an imaginative world on stage and works in harmony with the staging, music and dance where audiences travel from the Alps to the Amazonian jungles and beyond.
Soprano Soraya Mafi returns to WNO after her performance as Gilda in the 2024 WNO production of Rigoletto and joins the cast as Cunégonde. Making her WNO debut is mezzo-soprano Amy J Payne who joins the cast as The Old Lady. Also new to the cast are baritone Jack Holton as Maximillian and Welsh tenor Ryan Vaughan Davies who both have worked with WNO on previous productions. Ed Lyon returns to the title role of Candide, which won him critical acclaim, Welsh tenor Aled Hall and mezzo-soprano Francesca Saracino return as the Governor and Paquette respectively.
Candide will open in Cardiff on Wednesday 17 September and will tour alongside Tosca to Southampton, Llandudno and Bristol.
Director James Bonas said:
‘When we made Candide in Cardiff and toured the show that’s just what happened. The audience responded with delight to the humour, wit and joy in the animations, they fell in love with the singers, and they were swept away by the lunacy of the story coupled with Bernstein’s glittering tunes. And now we get to do it all again! Ed Lyon returns as Candide alongside the outstanding Soraya Mafi as Cunégonde, with Jack Holton as her brother Maximillian. The hilarious Amy J Payne will join their adventures as the Old Lady and in the double role of Pangloss and Narrator it is thrilling to have Welsh actor Rakie Ayola, BAFTA winning star of stage and screen. Of course, front and centre will be the WNO Chorus – showing us the way through the landscape and playing a whole line up of wonderful characters. Overseeing it all we have the brilliant Ryan McAdams conducting the WNO Orchestra. Life is happiness indeed!’
A Night at the Opera
WNO Chorus and Orchestra join forces for A Night at the Opera concerts this Autumn Season showcasing some of opera’s most loved and unforgettable melodies, featuring famous works from the world’s greatest composers. The concerts will include Intermezzo from Cavalleria rusticana, Un bel di (One Fine Day) from Madam Butterfly and Witches’ Chorus from Macbeth. These concerts are the perfect way to discover opera for the first time. A Night at the Opera will be performed in Southampton, Llandudno, Bristol and Plymouth.
Wellness with WNO – Creative Wellbeing Programme
In partnership with Swansea Bay University Health Board Paediatrics Department, WNO continues its Creative Wellbeing programme this Autumn. The aim of the project is to use a range of creative arts activities and utilise breathing and singing techniques from the Wellness with WNO programme.
WNO will be delivering an 18-week programme of creative activity which will involve working with a comprehensive school in Neath with 18 learners who may be experiencing low confidence and anxiety. This year the project will be held in an ALN school, Ysgol Maes y Coed. The pupils will work towards creating a Mini Opera of their own making including producing artwork, characters and background as well as composing an original score. The creative team will combine all the pupils’ hard work and ideas to create a final performance which family members will be invited to in Spring 2026.
Schools Concerts
This Autumn, WNO’s annual Schools Concerts will be presented by Elin Llwyd and feature new Associate Artist Owain Rowlands, previous Associate Artist Eiry Price alongside the WNO Orchestra. The programme will take young audiences aged 7-11 on a journey into the world of classical music, inspired this year by birds. The concert will feature composers including Respighi, Mozart, Stravinsky and Dilys Elwyn-Edwards and will be complemented by video footage provided by the RSPB.
WNO’s Schools Concerts are designed to support the Curriculum for Wales and National Curriculum in England. The concerts will open in Cardiff and tour to Southampton, Llandudno and Plymouth alongside WNO’s Autumn productions. WNO’s regular Programmes and Engagement activity, Cradle Choir and Teach, will continue throughout the Season.
WNO Youth Opera
WNO Youth Opera weekly sessions return in September working towards The Seligman Youth Opera Performance Showcase in 2026, with up to 80 participants and alumni students joining the cast for two performances in May.
ENDS
Notes to Editors
Welsh National Opera is the national opera company for Wales, funded by the Arts Councils of Wales and England to provide large-scale opera, concerts and outreach across Wales and to major cities in the English regions. We endeavour to provide transformative experiences through our education and outreach programme and our award-winning digital projects. We work with our partners to discover and nurture young operatic talent, and we aim to show future generations that opera is a rewarding, relevant and universal art form with the power to affect and inspire.
WNO production images are available for download at wno.org.uk/press
Further information on WNO’s productions can be found at wno.org.uk
- Leading production support from the Colwinston Charitable Trust
- Production support from Dunard Fund
- WNO Teach is supported by the Garfield Weston Foundation and the Gibbs Trust.
- Wellness with WNO is supported by Arts Council Wales via the Arts, Health, and Wellbeing Lottery Fund
- Leader of WNO Orchestra is supported by Mathew and Lucy Prichard
- WNO Orchestra is supported by Mathew and Lucy Prichard
- WNO Orchestra Chairs are supported by Principal Players Circle
- WNO is grateful for the generous support of the Shirley & Rolf Olsen Bursary, Sheila and Richard Brooks Bursary, Anthony Evans Scholarship, The Eira Francis Davies Bursary, Fidelio Charitable Trust, Joseph Strong Frazer Trust, Stanley Picker Trust, The Noël Coward Foundation, Thriplow Charitable Trust and the Chris Ball Bursary towards our WNO Associate Artist programme
- Wellness with WNO – Creative Wellbeing is supported by Swansea Bay University Health Board
- Wellness with WNO – Creative Wellbeing is supported by the Gwendoline and Margaret Davies Charity
- WNO Youth Opera and The Seligman WNO Youth Opera Performance is supported by the bequest of the late David Seligman and the Seligman Gift, the Gibbs Trust, the Clive Richards Foundation, and Andrew Fletcher
For more information, photos or interviews please contact:
Christina Blakeman, Communications Manager
