Satyagraha English National Opera, in rep until 26 March When Philip Glass’s opera Satyagraha was first put on by ENO in 2007, I found it intolerably tedious, to the point where I felt that if I didn’t leave the theatre I might start to scream. Yet I came across quite a few people, some of
Ruddigore Opera North, touring What is wrong with me? I kept asking myself that question as I endured the two hours and 40 minutes of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Ruddigore in the Grand Theatre, Leeds, while most of the audience rocked with laughter and regularly burst into delighted applause. I hadn’t originally intended to go, but
Prokofiev’s opera The Gambler adapts Dostoevsky’s novella of the same name, an audacious enterprise. Prokofiev’s opera The Gambler adapts Dostoevsky’s novella of the same name, an audacious enterprise. Unfortunately, it fails, as I think all the composer’s operas do, apart perhaps from The Love for Three Oranges, and mainly because he gives no evidence of
Lucia di Lammermoor English National Opera, in rep until 26 February When David Alden’s production of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor was first staged by ENO two years ago it was so beset by cast illnesses that it was difficult to tell to what extent the director’s intentions were executed. Even so, the musical side of
Così fan tutte Royal Opera Phaedra Barbican When Jonathan Miller’s production of Così fan tutte was first mounted at the Royal Opera in 1995, it was the Armani clothes which received the most attention. Over the years there have been many modifications, and it now bears little relationship, certainly in the direction of the singers,
Anniversary-consciousness is no doubt primarily commercially driven, certainly in the music world, where the fact that a scarcely remembered composer has been dead for exactly 300 years is a reason for featuring him as This Week’s Composer on Radio Three, but more importantly for many record companies to persuade us that it is time to
Elektra Barbican La bohème Opera North In his little-read but wonderful book Daybreak, Nietzsche writes: Our composers have made a great discovery: interesting ugliness too is possible in their art! And so they throw themselves into this open ocean of ugliness as if drunk, and it has never been so easy to compose…But you will
La bohème Royal Opera House Thanks to the cautiousness of the major opera companies over the festive season, I saw Puccini’s La bohème twice in five days, with another couple of productions to go. The most fascinating aspect, for me, of seeing the Royal Opera’s 577th performance of this masterpiece, in John Copley’s production from
La Bohème Cock Tavern The Enchanted Pig Linbury Studio Puccini’s La Bohème has oddly become the Christmas opera of choice, broadcast on BBC TV on Christmas afternoon (an especially ludicrous affair), and major opera houses dusting down their elderly versions. I doubt whether any of them will be as involving, indeed thrilling and upsetting, as
Der Rosenkavalier Royal Opera House Der Rosenkavalier is the most self-conscious of comedies, as well as being largely concerned with self-consciousness. It has two kinds of joke: one, the broad practical jokes indulged in at enormous length at Baron Ochs’s expense; the other, the sophisticated humour of youthful illusions being dashed, while others rapidly spring
Otello Barbican Die Zauberflöte Royal College of Music Verdi’s Otello has almost become a rarity since Domingo gave up singing the title role, so its inclusion in the LSO series of concert performances under Sir Colin Davis was most welcome, and all the more so when it was announced that, at extremely short notice, the
Cecilia Bartoli Barbican Messiah Coliseum After a brief but inspissatedly tedious overture by Porpora, played by Il Giardino Armonico, the curtains at the Barbican were pulled aside and Cecilia Bartoli, dressed like a highwayperson from a 1940s escapist movie, sprang on to the stage, flung off her feathered hat, rocked with superabundant energy as the
Cherevichki Royal Opera Tolomeo English Touring Opera, Cambridge Semele Royal Academy of Music The week’s operatic rarity was Tchaikovsky’s Cherevichki, inaccu-rately translated as The Tsarina’s Slippers. It is an adaptation of the Gogol story ‘Christmas Eve’, and is slightly more familiar in Rimsky-Korsakov’s version, which was mounted in a spirited production at ENO in 1988.
Duke Bluebeard’s Castle English National Opera Swanhunter Opera North Bartok’s only opera, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle, shouldn’t be a difficult work to stage, to sing and to play, yet most of my worthwhile experiences of it have been listening to recordings — where it has done notably well. Though the plotline is as simple as can
L’assedio di Calais Guildhall School of Music and Drama This is the time of year, before the long hibernation of opera companies sets in, when there is sometimes a choice of several operas per night, many of them performed by the schools of music, which often seem to adopt the unintelligent course of having their
Porgy and Bess Royal Festival Hall Artaxerxes Linbury Studio Cape Town Opera has been on tour in the last ten days, taking its production of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess to Cardiff, the Southbank Centre and Edinburgh. I went to the first of the two London performances, staged but without scenery. The action took place behind
The Turn of the Screw English National Opera L’heure espagnole; Gianni Schicchi Royal Opera House Each time I see Britten’s The Turn of the Screw I am more impressed by the brilliance of the music, and more irritated by the unprofitable ambiguities of the drama. The first revival at the Coliseum of David McVicar’s stunningly
Werther; The Adventures of Mr Broucek Opera North The Truth about Love Linbury Studio Massenet’s Werther is a tricky opera, in fact may well not be susceptible of more than a production which leaves you feeling that you could easily live with its not very numerous highlights. One of its chief problems is highlighted in
Letters of a Love Betrayed Linbury Studio Carmen Royal Opera House Wozzeck Royal Festival Hall A hectic operatic week, three down and two (to be reviewed next week) to go, began lamentably with what I’m in danger of coming to think of as the archetypical Linbury experience. That hideous place, a kind of operatic Nibelheim
Tristan und Isolde Royal Opera House Tristan und Isolde is a masterpiece that can be given widely different interpretations, since even by Wagner’s standards it is permeated by ambiguities. He may have intended, as he wrote in that famous letter to Liszt, to write ‘a monument to that most beautiful of dreams’, that is, completely