Opera Reviews

Intermezzo, Buxton Festival

philip Radcliffe Sunday, 08 July 2012

No sooner had the Olympic torch been run out of town than in rushed the cavalcade of opera singers, musicians, actors, dancers and literary talkers for the start of the 34th Buxton Festival. Leading them, so to speak, was Stephen Barlow, the new Artistic Director. Nothing daunted, he decided to take up the baton for the opening night.

Le nozze di Figaro, Glyndebourne Festival Opera

Igor Toronyi-Lalic Saturday, 30 June 2012

It's amazing how long it takes to realise that we're in the 1970s in Michael Grandage's new Glyndebourne production of Le nozze di Figaro. The mansion house suggests that we're in the 18th century. The light and latticework says we're in Mozart's original Seville. The poor villagers that scurry about during the overture preparing the stage for visitors could be from pretty much anywhere Mediterranean and from any century.

Dr Dee, English National Opera

alexandra Coghlan Friday, 29 June 2012

Riding the same wave of affectionate, riotously melancholic Englishness which carried Jez Butterworth’s Jerusalem to success, Damon Albarn’s Dr Dee is dark enough to delight even the most cynical of Jubilee naysayers, gorgeous enough in its national pageantry to crown the cultural celebrations of this landmark year.

Comment

Katya Kabanova, Longborough Festival

stephen Walsh Wednesday, 27 June 2012

Janáček’s obsession with Russia has always intrigued me: something to do with a shared Slav ancestry traceable to peasant roots being crunched to pieces by the modern world. Gone are the rolling paragraphs and the vast, empty fields and sky. In Katya Kabanova everyone is hemmed in by ancient attitudes and superstitions, and the music, with its abrupt, laconic gestures, is a part of the prison.

Les Troyens, Royal Opera

Igor Toronyi-Lalic Tuesday, 26 June 2012

Les Troyens is one of music's mythical beasts. The greatest opera that few will have ever seen. Until recently the epic was considered so demanding that it was thought unstageable. David McVicar's new production for the Royal Opera House is only the second in its history. So for most of us last night will have been the first chance to witness the five-hour masterpiece in its original French.

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Billy Budd, English National Opera

Ismene Brown Tuesday, 19 June 2012

It should be hard to make Britten’s Billy Budd a bloodless, passionless, contextless bore, shouldn’t it? This is after all a lacerating story about men behaving badly on a fighting ship in the 1797 wars between Britain and Revolutionary France, a story where a man of great viciousness meets a man of much havering and a decent, possibly extraordinary lad loses his life.

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Bow Down, The Village Underground, Spitalfields Festival

alexandra Coghlan Thursday, 14 June 2012

There’s a lovely moment in The Opera Group’s production of Bow Down. An actor motions to a member of the audience and grins bleakly: “He thought he was here for an opera….”. It’s an aside, over before we’ve even fully registered it, but it’s one that reminds us that both Tony Harrison and Harrison Birtwistle knew exactly what they were doing when they constructed this amputated, bleeding limb of a work and christened it an “opera”, back in 1977.

Così Fan Tutte, Opera Holland Park

David Benedict Saturday, 09 June 2012

With the obvious exceptions of Verdi’s twin masterpieces Otello and Falstaff, Così fan tutte is the most Shakespearean of operas. Centuries before anyone invented the term, it’s nothing less than opera’s most elegant study in sexual politics. Written with the textural richness and emotional reversals of Much Ado About Nothing, it needs acting/singing performances of true depth in order to succeed.

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Lucia di Lammermoor, Opera Holland Park

alexandra Coghlan Friday, 08 June 2012

Out-characterising anything on stage last night, London’s weather certainly did its bit to celebrate the start of the Opera Holland Park summer season. No Scottish heath could have been more blasted, no moorland more battered by the wind than we were in the shadow of “Lammermoor Castle” (aka Holland House) for the company’s Lucia di Lammermoor.

La Bohème, Glyndebourne Festival Opera

David Benedict Thursday, 07 June 2012

It has romantic sweep but is held firm by zealous attention to detail and while it’s hugely expansive of gesture, it’s never generalised. I’m talking about Kirill Karabits’ conducting of La bohème at Glyndebourne. I wish I could say the same for the production.