Perhaps the Tippett centenary has come too soon, and the seven years since the composer’s death have been insufficient for his achievement to be digested and for the anniversary celebrations to take on any real significance. But no matter how much time had passed, I doubt that his third opera, The Knot Garden, will ever seem more than a period piece, wedded to the late 1960s when it was written.
The Knot Garden
Theatre Royal, Glasgow
Andrew Clements
Friday January 21, 2005
The Guardian
Perhaps the Tippett centenary has come too soon, and the seven years since the composer's death have been insufficient for his achievement to be digested and for the anniversary celebrations to take on any real significance. But no matter how much time had passed, I doubt that his third opera, The Knot Garden, will ever seem more than a period piece, wedded to the late 1960s when it was written.
With a libretto that contains lines such as "Honey, make love to me" and "Play it cool", there are moments during Scottish Opera's new production when it feels as if we are watching Austin Powers — The Opera rather than a significant stage work by one of Britain's most admired composers of the 20th century. What seemed to many of us a quarter of a century ago so touching and psychologically acute, so richly allusive (musically and textually), is now contrived and embarrassing — especially given its setting in a cosily bourgeois world in which all personal hang-ups and soured relationships can be put to rights with a spot of free love and the expensive help of a psychoanalyst.
[Click here for remainder of review.]