Opera Reviews
The Excursions of Mr Brouček, Grange Park Opera review - biting satire from bouncing CzechsFriday, 10 June 2022
Now for something completely different. The Excursions of Mr Brouček is Leos Janáček’s least typical opera and is rarely performed. Among his tragic tales such as Jenufa and Kat’a Kabanova, the charm of The Cunning Little Vixen and the strangely heart-twisting The Makropoulos Case, the Czech composer's biting satire – in which the time-travelling anti-hero is chiefly "blotto" – faces an uphill struggle for a look-in. Read more... |
Orfeo ed Euridice, Blackwater Valley Opera Festival review - heavenly possibilities, devils at work in the detailsTuesday, 07 June 2022
"Elysian" is the best way to describe the dream gardens of Ireland's Lismore Castle in early June: lupins, alliums and peonies rampant in endless herbaceous borders, supernatural perspectives towards the main building on various levels. This year’s Blackwater Valley Opera Festival production of Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice, not so much: easily adjustable circumstances worked too often against talented performers in the converted stables space pressed into service once a year. Read more... |
Così fan tutte, Garsington Opera review - gambling with the highest stakesFriday, 03 June 2022
The scene is Monte-Carlo, around the beginning of the last century: a carefully observed world of cloudless skies, glittering seas, high society and careless privilege shared with Death in Venice. Read more... |
Parsifal, Opera North review - full focus and a dream line-upThursday, 02 June 2022
Wagner, in his medievalist, pan-European, 19th century way, wanted Parsifal to be a blend of abstract and religious experience for his audiences at Bayreuth, calling it a “festival play for a stage consecration”. Questions for those performing it today include how to do justice to its philosophical baggage as well as its marvellous music, and whether to introduce new elements in the visual staging that the composer never thought of. Read more... |
Siegfried, Longborough Festival review - happily concept-free but with 'Good Ideas'Tuesday, 31 May 2022
With a lapse of three years between Das Rheingold and Siegfried, and with only a semi-staged Walküre in between, it’s been hard to stay tuned to Amy Lane’s Ring production at Longborough. Read more... |
Madama Butterfly, Hallé, Elder, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - an opera masterclassMonday, 30 May 2022
An opera in the Hallé concert series, conducted by Sir Mark Elder, is rather like a blend of a religious observance and a masterclass in orchestral playing and singing technique. Read more... |
Samson et Dalila, Royal Opera review - from austerity to excess, with visual rigour and aural beautyFriday, 27 May 2022
Words and situations are one-dimensional, but the music is chameleonic, if not profound, and crafted with a master’s hand. What to do about Saint-Saëns’s Biblical hokum? In Richard Jones’s new production, the end justifies the means, with persecuted Hebrews and mocking Philistines circling two essential star turns, and Antonio Pappano’s handling of a hard-to-pace score is vivid from opening keenings to final cataclysm. Read more... |
Le nozze di Figaro, Glyndebourne review - fabulous singing and a classy productionTuesday, 24 May 2022
After two years of Covid-affected performances – even though there was a full season last year – Glyndebourne's annual festival is finally back in full glory. Following the big blaze of Saturday's The Wreckers, Sunday welcomed back Michael Grandage's durable production of a signature treasure, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro. Read more... |
The Wreckers, Glyndebourne review - no masterpiece, but vividly sung and playedSunday, 22 May 2022
Interesting for the history of music, but not for music? Passing acquaintance with Ethel Smyth’s The Wreckers, a grand opera by a woman at a time (the early 1900s) when circumstances made such a thing near-impossible, had suggested so. Read more... |
Fidelio, Insula Orchestra, Barbican review - truth and justice brought to lightFriday, 13 May 2022
Thanks to the pandemic, the planned tidal surge of Fidelio productions never quite happened during Beethoven’s anniversary year of 2020. Instead, the birthday’s boy’s sole opera – beset by glitches and re-thinks ever since its creation – has rolled on intermittent waves into houses and halls around the world. Read more... |
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