Forza majeure

To stage Verdi’s Il Trovatore, they say, is easy: you just need the four greatest singers in the world. The Royal Opera has applied this principle to La forza del destino. Jonas Kaufmann sings Alvaro, Anna Netrebko is his beloved Leonora, and Ludovic Tézier her brother Carlo, with the mighty Ferruccio Furlanetto completing the set as the priest Padre Guardiano. The results have been pretty much as you might expect, ranging from the now-traditional speculation about whether Kaufmann would actually show up (he did) to reports of tickets changing hands privately for £5,000 apiece.

And yes, it was extraordinary: a four-hour rush of some of the most glorious singing anyone born after 1970 will probably ever have heard in one place. Netrebko’s voice is phenomenal, capable even at its softest of floating luminously over a full orchestra, and seemingly controlled by an internal dimmer switch that can turn a phrase from a diaphanous whisper up to a searchlight blaze.