Opera Reviews

Ariadne auf Naxos, Longborough Festival review - appetising energy and wit

stephen Walsh Saturday, 14 July 2018

Much as I love Strauss’s Ariadne in its final form, I have a sneaking nostalgia for the original version (attached to Hofmannsthal’s adaptation of Molière’s Le bourgeois gentilhomme), which had Zerbinetta and her companions popping up after the final love duet and gently letting out some of its gas.

Alzira / The Daughter of the Regiment, Buxton Festival review – thundering good tunes

Robert Beale Wednesday, 11 July 2018

Alzira is Verdi’s shortest opera and his least performed, and you have to ask why.

Idomeneo, Buxton Festival review - revolution in the head

Richard Bratby Monday, 09 July 2018

The audience at the Buxton International Festival has a way of cutting to the essence of a production.

Pelléas et Mélisande, Glyndebourne review - frigid metatheatre

David Nice Sunday, 01 July 2018

Pierre Boulez simply crystallised the obvious when he described Debussy's unique masterpiece as "theatre of cruelty," despite its enigmatic beginnings. Richard Jones, when I asked him to talk about its plot, declared "it's about two men who love the same woman, with disastrous results". Productions by Jones, Peter Stein with Boulez conducting and Vick at Glyndebourne have all had us shaking with fear and weeping with pity.

Comment

The Turn of the Screw, ENO, Regent's Park Open Air Theatre review - one dimension, not four

David Nice Tuesday, 26 June 2018

Opera and music theatre have set the birds shrilling in Regent's Park before in the shape of Gershwin's Porgy and Bess – a very forgettable production – and Sondheim's Into the Woods – much better, and a score which can give any 20th century opera a run for its money in terms of thematic interconnection.

Comment

Partenope, Iford Arts review - a midsummer night's dream of a Handel comedy

alexandra Coghlan Tuesday, 26 June 2018

Rejected by London’s Royal Academy of Music in 1726 on grounds of frivolity, Partenope is the ultimate Handelian rom-com – a comedy whose intriguing is carried out with a smile, a swagger and a sparkle in the eye.

La Traviata, Longborough Festival review - muddled director, vocal mixed bag

stephen Walsh Monday, 25 June 2018

One wearies of quarrelling with opera directors’ concepts. But what’s the alternative? To ignore or acquiesce in crude, approximate reimaginings that, like Daisy Evans's new La Traviata at Longborough, stuff a work any old how into some snappy, after-dinner parody that says nothing useful about the piece, vulgarises the situations and confuses or misrepresents the text.

The Abduction from the Seraglio, The Grange Festival review - enjoyable if conventional production

Bernard Hughes Monday, 25 June 2018

Just as the Last Night of the Proms is an end-of-term party with a concert tacked on, The Grange Festival (like other similar venues) offers a massive picnic interspersed with some opera.

theartsdesk in Paris - following in the footsteps of Gounod

alexandra Coghlan Sunday, 24 June 2018

It’s a truism that history is written by the victors, but nowhere in classical music is the argument made more persuasively than in the legacy and reputation of Charles Gounod.

The Path to Heaven, RNCM, Manchester review - tragedy, truth, passion

Robert Beale Friday, 22 June 2018

Adam Gorb’s The Path to Heaven, with libretto by Ben Kaye, is his longest work to date (almost two hours’ running time without interval) and on a story that could hardly be more tragic – the Holocaust.

inside opera

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