Mainly Opera and Ballet
The first year of preparation for Longborough’s new Ring has started with a very effective production of Das Rheingold.The excellent use of video designs by Tim Baxter shows Valhalla peeping through the clouds, and the approach to the rainbow bridge at the end adds a cosmic touch to Wotan’s dream palace. Musically wonderful under the baton …
This opening of the Opera Holland Park season saw a production of Puccini’s first masterpiece by young director Karolina Sofulak, who updated this story of a girl torn between the student Des Grieux and the elderly aristocrat Geronte from its natural place in the eighteenth century to the swinging sixties. It didn’t work, and the …
A thrilling revival of the 2016 production, once again under the excellent baton of Gianluca Marcianò. Clive Bayley and Ruxandra Donose reprised their beautifully nuanced performances as Philip II and Princess Eboli, joined this time by international rising star Leonardo Capalbo as Carlo, and Brett Polegato as Rodrigo, both superb, with Marina Costa-Jackson singing strongly …
A terrific revival of Tosca with Bryn Terfel as Scarpia and Kristine Opolais as Tosca under the wonderfully sensitive baton of Alexander Joel. Vittorio Grigolo’s resounding tenor as Cavaradossi lacked some magic and nobility, but wonderful performances of Angelotti and the Sacristan. See my review in The Article.
In this hugely welcome revival of David McVicar’s 2015 production, the three greatest moments came in Act III: Sondra Radvanovsky’s terrific Mamma morta, Dimitri Platanias’s cri de coeur against the wrong turn the Revolution has taken, and Elena Zilio’s electrifying cameo about giving her grandson to fight and die for France. Roberto Alagna’s Chenier was less …
When it all seemed to be over a dance encore was performed, to music extracted from earlier in Berlioz’s score. But this did not redeem Richard Jones’s dreary production, which made a lacklustre start to the new Glyndebourne Season. See my review in The Article
A hugely moving performance of Deborah Warner’s new production under the baton of Ivor Bolton, with Toby Spence superb as Captain Vere, with Brindley Sherratt a vivid Claggart, and Jacques Imbrailo conveying the fatal charm and blinding honesty of Billy himself. See my review in The Article.
Sensational performance by Michael Fabiano as Faust, with devilishly seductive Erwin Schrott as Mephistophélès, and Mandy Fredrich making a fine ROH debut as Marguerite. She replaced Irina Lungu (fever and sore throat), who in turn replaced Diana Damrau (slipped disc), arriving just in time by taxi from the airport. Superb conducting by Dan Ettinger. See …
Wonderful casts for this Christof Loy production of Verdi’s Forza, plus terrific conducting by Pappano make this essential viewing, though tickets are in short supply and one pair was reportedly sold for £7,000. See my review in The Article
The wise Libuše, mythical founder of the Czech people, is the subject of this ‘festival’ opera that Smetana originally composed for the planned coronation of Austrian emperor Franz-Joseph as King of Bohemia in the early 1870s. That never happened, so he saved it for the opening of the National Theatre in Prague in 1881. Apart …
