For the New York City Opera at Lincoln Center, the spring season in the New York State Theater typically begins with a run of a musical theater work. This year’s selection was Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd, which I heard on March 11th. The piece contains some of Sondheim’s more persuasive music and verse; still, I have never been especially fond of it. At heart it’s a Grand Guignol horror show for the pre-adolescent mind, a second cousin of the “slasher” film genre. Yet it has its odd appeal and has not wanted for performances or audiences. Mark Delavan, a genuine operatic baritone, made a huge (albeit amplified) sound as Todd; Elaine Page struggled, with some success, to skirt the immense shadow of Angela Lansbury’s Mrs. Lovett. All in all, the production played cleanly, conducted by the company’s music director, George Manahan.

On March 30th I heard a revival of Stephen Wadsworth’s acclaimed production of Handel’s Xerxes (or Serse). It had much of the flavor and brio of Wadsworth’s original, which opened in Santa Fe and trundled around the country, enjoying success in a number of venues, including an earlier City Opera visit. Its conceit is that it is set not in Persia but in 1730s London; indeed, much of its style derives from Thomas Lynch’s excellent set of a London street and townhouse. Alas, Wadsworth’s careful direction was not quite settled on the night I heard the work. The cast seemed a bit tentative in their