What now for ENO?

It has been a bracing start to the year at English National Opera. David Alden’s production of Peter Grimes, praised to the skies for the musical performance under Edward Gardner, returned to the Coliseum. Next up is Rigoletto (reviewed on page 50), directed by Alden’s twin, Christopher. Then comes Rodelinda, in another new production (or co-production, as is often the way these days) by Richard Jones.

Audiences will be particularly keen to see the Rigoletto, and not shy of making comparisons with the celebrated production by Jonathan Miller, which has finally been stood down after three decades. Hanging over everything, though, is the realisation that Gardner’s time at the helm is drawing to a close. Next summer the music director will end an eight-year term in the post before taking up the principal conductor’s position with the Bergen Philharmonic, which occupies a position in the second division of European orchestras. That is not to belittle the Norwegians. But Bergen is not Berlin or even Birmingham, where Gardner is currently the principal guest conductor of the CBSO. Why could he not have combined the two positions? Clearly he felt his race was run.

The new man, appointed last month to a few raised eyebrows, is Mark Wigglesworth. Two decades ago, after he had won the Kondrashin conducting competition in Amsterdam, Wigglesworth worked regularly with the great orchestras of Europe and America. This month he can be found in the boondocks of Colorado and Utah. So when his position was announced last month, people looked at each other and wondered: ‘Is this Granada I see, or is it just Asbury Park?’

Gardner leaves ENO with his reputation enhanced but with the house in a state of arrested development. This is not the chaos of a decade ago, when Oleg Caetani’s appointment as music director was rescinded before he had climbed into the saddle.