Karolos play Conway Hall [Tassos Hadjicocolis]

OLD hands at opera might suppress a sigh that the new production opening this week at Covent Garden is yet another Carmen – as if there weren’t enough opportunities to see the most regularly staged piece in the repertoire. Arts Council England, who have just produced a (frankly rather foolish) report complaining about “old” works coming round and round again on opera stages, can only be apoplectic.

But – and it’s a big but – this new Carmen makes two claims on your attention. One: it’s directed by Damiano Michieletto who, for my money, ranks among the outstanding talents of today. If you saw his last show at the Garden, a gutting Cav & Pag that was like revisiting this familiar double-bill in super-high definition, you’ll know why. And two: it stars the mezzo Aigul Akhmetshina who is, these days, arguably the leading Carmen worldwide. Runs April 5-May 31. A hot ticket. roh.org.uk

• Hard to believe but it’s a year since the coronation of King Charles; and though it hasn’t been the best 12 months for the royal family, the London Handel Festival is marking the anniversary with a musical celebration – pairing Handel’s Coronation Anthems with new commissions from contemporary British composers who range from the established Roderick Williams to the up, coming and seriously interesting Ben Nobuto. St Martin in the Fields, April 6.

And if you’re seriously interested in Handel, you’ll also want to know that the Festival is staging one of his early works Aci, Galatea e Polifemo, April 10-13, in the unlikely setting of Trinity Buoy Wharf on the river near Canning Town. It’s a trek to get to but potentially a magical experience. And unlike Carmen, this is something you rarely get the chance to see – written when Handel was a young man in Naples, flexing his musical muscles with a story of youthful love tragically frustrated. london-handel-festival.com

• When Handel ended up in London, he was a regular visitor to the Vauxhall pleasure gardens, now long gone. But their spirit of civility and raciness (with the distraction of goings-on in the bushes) is maintained (minus the bushes) by the latterday Vauxhall Band: a period ensemble who play that earthy variant on the clarinet, the basset horn. They’re in Highgate on April 8, doing their Vauxhall stuff in doubtless the most decorous way at the Hampstead Lane salon run by Michelle Berriedale-Johnson. salonmusic.co.uk

• The Sunday concerts at Conway Hall in Holborn have been going strong since 1887; and they start their new spring season April 7 with the string trio Karolos playing Schubert, Bach, Mozart. Conway Hall is a concert environment like no other in London, slightly shabby but much-loved. Worth supporting. conwayhall.org.uk

• Finally, a batch of must-hear pianists. The glamorous Bruce Liu is at the Royal Festival Hall April 7 playing Rachmaninov’s deathless 2nd Concerto with the Philharmonia Orchestra (southbankcentre.co.uk). The mesmerising blind star Noboyuki Tsujii plays more Rachmaninov in a solo recital at Wigmore Hall, April 6 (wigmore-hall.org.uk). And the not so well-known but award-winning Anthony Ratinov is at the intimate Razumovsky Academy, Kensal Green, April 10, playing Schubert and Scriabin (razumovsky.co.uk).