Whenever Hänsel and Gretel comes around, it’s always an opportunity for a director to bring a fresh perspective on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale. Humperdinck’s 1893 stage work, hailed by Richard…
Month: March 2023
English Touring Opera’s spring tour sets out on an Italian sojourn
With the familial knots of the guest list for Charles III’s coronation still to be unravelled and the UK still stretching itself on the Brexit-rack, Il viaggio a Reims, Rossini’s…
Tristan et Isolde in Toulouse
Well beyond all Tristan basics the Opéra de Toulouse boasted two ravishing singers and an electrifying conductor in this revival of its excellent 2007 Nicolas Joël production. Austrian tenor Nikolai…
London Handel Festival: In the Realms of Sorrow at Stone Nest
Charcoaled-eyes and glitter-tears. Swirling coils of murky smoke. Twilight-zone lighting. Sensuousness verging on violence. Certainly not what Handel’s wealthy Roman patrons would have experienced when the young composer presented private…
Rusalka at the Royal Opera House
A strange evening: I very much enjoyed this new Rusalka, though found myself slightly haunted by the suspicion I did so more than I should have done. Musically magnificent yet…