The last time Beethoven’s sole opera, Fidelio, was performed at the Proms, in 2009, Daniel Barenboim was making a somewhat belated London opera debut with his West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.
Author: Claire Seymour
The Merchant of Venice: WNO at Covent Garden
In Out of Africa, her account of her Kenyan life, Karen Blixen relates an anecdote, ‘Farah and The Merchant of Venice’. When Blixen told Farah Aden, her Somali butler, the story of Shakespeare’s play, he was disappointed and surprised by the denouement: surely, he argued, the Jew Shylock could have succeeded in his bond if he had used a red-hot knife? As an African, Farah expected a different narrative, demonstrating that our reception of art depends so much on our assumptions and preconceptions.
Leoncavallo’s Zaz‡ at Investec Opera Holland Park
The make-up is slapped on thickly in this new production of Leoncavallo’s Zaz‡ by director Marie Lambert and designer Alyson Cummings at Investec Opera Holland Park.
Jette Parker Young Artists Summer Performance at Covent Garden
The end of the ROH’s summer season was marked as usual by the Jette Parker Young Artists Summer Performance but this year’s showcase was a little lacklustre at times.
K·t’a Kabanov· at Investec Opera Holland Park
If there was any doubt of the insignificance of mankind in the face of the forces of Nature, then Yannis Thavoris’ design for Olivia Fuchs production of Jan·?ek’s K·t’a Kabanov· – first seen at Investec Opera Holland Park in 2009 – would puncture it in a flash, figuratively and literally.
A bel canto feast at Cadogan Hall
The bel canto repertoire requires stylish singing, with beautiful tone and elegant phrasing. Strength must be allied with grace in order to coast the vocal peaks with unflawed legato; flexibility blended with accuracy ensures the most bravura passages are negotiated with apparent ease.
Don Pasquale: a cold-hearted comedy at Glyndebourne
Director Mariame ClÈment’s Don Pasquale, first seen during the 2011 tour and staged in the house in 2013, treads a fine line between realism and artifice.
Die schˆne M¸llerin: Davies and Drake provoke fresh thoughts at Middle Temple Hall
Schubert wrote Die schˆne M¸llerin (1824) for a tenor (or soprano) range – that of his own voice. Wilhelm M¸ller’s poems depict the youthful unsophistication of a country lad who, wandering with carefree unworldliness besides a burbling stream, comes upon a watermill, espies the miller’s fetching daughter and promptly falls in love – only to be disillusioned when she spurns him for a virile hunter. So, perhaps the tenor voice possesses the requisite combination of lightness and yearning to convey this trajectory from guileless innocence to disenchantment and dejection.
Fairytale Spectacle: Turandot at the ROH
Andrei Serban’s 1984 production of Turandot has returned to the Royal Opera House, for its sixteenth revival, and it remains a visual feast. The principals’ raw silk costumes, intricately embroidered and patterned, splash vibrant primary hues against the shadowy tiers which house the red-masked Chorus to the rear.
Natalya Romaniw: ‘one of the outstanding sopranos of her generation’
There can hardly be a dry eye in the house, at the ‘Theatre in the Woods’ at West Horsley Place – Grange Park Opera’s new home – when, in Act 3 of Jan·?ek’s first mature opera, Natalya Romaniw’s Jen?fa realises that the tiny child whose frozen body has been discovered under the ice is her own dead son.