We don’t need a work of art to be perfect. As the literary critic Randall Jarrell, writing about Walt Whitman’s poem “Song of Myself,” said of one section: “There are faults in this passage, and they do not matter.” And yet, sometimes a production comes along that floats beatifically, in a place we call perfection. This jewel-like Barber of Seville, the work of the late director Ruth Berghaus and the designer Achim Freyer, circa 1968, is now 51 years old and still sparkles. Irreplaceable! —L.J.

Il Barbiere di Siviglia, by Gioachino Rossini was featured in the January 18, 2020 issue of Air Mail. Read on