Luigi Cherubini is the pantomime villain of French romantic music. As head of the Paris Conservatoire in the 1820s he was the embodiment of obsolescence: Berlioz’s Memoirs recount an occasion when some state functionary told the ageing master that he should really write an opera. ‘One can dimly imagine the indignant consternation of the author of Medea, Les deux journées, Lodoïska, Mont Saint-Bernard…’ writes Berlioz with twinkling malice, though most modern operagoers, if they’re honest, won’t be any wiser.
The one exception is Medea, which has never quite dropped into obscurity. Fiona Shaw’s new production at the Wexford Festival shakes it brusquely back to life. We’re at a hen party at a day spa. Glauce (Ruth Iniesta) and her girlfriends loll about in pink sashes and Lycra, while her fiancé Jason (Sergey Romanovsky) wears a tracksuit. Is this a reality TV send-up — Real Housewives of Corinth? How does that sit with the controlled ferocity of Stephen Barlow’s conducting, or the fluid, stylised expressiveness with which Iniesta, Romanovsky and Adam Lau (Creon) sculpt their lines? And how to square it with the tremendous central figure of Medea herself, as portrayed by Lise Davidsen? Davidsen was merciless, not least to her own lustrous voice.
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