Timing isn’t absolutely everything, but it’s a lot. Rossini was the 20-something Cecilia Bartoli’s calling card when she shot to the top of her profession. Not so coincidentally, the year was 1992, marking the bicentennial of the so-called Swan of Pesaro’s birth (so called for his native city on the Adriatic). Three decades later, Bartoli’s still the girl to beat in the Rossini repertoire. In 2018, she celebrated the 150th anniversary of the composer’s death in a colorful new Salzburg production of the irresistibly tuneful farce The Italian Girl in Algiers, dashed off when Rossini was 21. Bartoli rode in, to universal delight, on a stuffed camel with a case of gas. That’s the show in revival in Zurich for New Year’s Eve and the first week of January. (The Salzburg edition is also available on video.) Caveat emptor: Nadezhda Karyazina takes over from Bartoli in the final performance. For all we know, she’s the next knockout. —Matthew Gurewitsch