Making a return visit to Brighton is Ellen Kent's Opera International featuring the State Companies of Chisinau and Odessa in Puccini's La Boheme and Verdi's Rigoletto.

La Boheme, the story of love and loss among artists in late 19th Century Paris, is one of opera's smash hits. Its opening success in Turin in 1896 was flashed around the world and it was in the repertory of most of the world's opera houses long before the beginning of the First World War.

Recently reincarnated in the storyline of Moulin Rouge, La Boheme is one of the most romantic operas ever written and packed with great tunes including Your Tiny Hand Is Frozen, They Call Me Mimi and Musetta's Waltz.

It also contains probably the saddest death in all opera - that of Mimi from consumption.

From its opening scene in the cold student apartment on Christmas Eve, through the lively scenes at the Caf Momus to the final agonising death, this is top-class musical entertainment which will make you laugh and cry.

You are well advised to take along a box of tissues.

With Rigoletto, Verdi takes us back to the Renaissance court and the Duke of Mantua to tell a compelling story of seduction, deceit and intrigue concerning an immoral prince and a jester, whose overwhelming love for his daughter leads to tragedy.

It is based on a play written by Victor Hugo, author of Les Misrables, and was censored when it first opened, ostensibly because of its sexuality but more likely because of its political content.

It was Verdi's 17th opera and contains three marvellous numbers: La Donna E Mobile, Questa La Quella and the beautiful soprano aria Caro Nome. Like all Ellen Kent's productions, you can expect lavish sets, sumptuous costumes and some magical touches.

In La Boheme, a member of the audience's pet dog will feature, while in Rigoletto there will be a golden eagle with a seven-foot wingspan on stage.

The singers of the Chisinau and Odessa opera companies are excellent and mostly Russian-trained. Irina Vingradova will take the role of Mimi, sharing it with Korean soprano Rosa Lee Thomas, who sang the title role in Madama Butterfly last year. Other singers include Italian-based tenor Ruslan Zinevych, who sang with Luciano Pavarotti last year, soprano Maria Tsonina, who won a recent Vienna Opera House competition, and the Ukranian tenor Andreij Payilov, who many critics have described as a young Placido Domingo.

Both operas will be sung in Italian with English surtitles. You can see La Boheme today, tomorrow, Wednesday and Saturday, and Rigoletto on Thursday and Friday.

Starts 7.30pm, Thur & Sat mats 2pm, £12.50-£30, 08700 606650