Under the guiding hand of Jack Furness, this new production brings out all the surreal joy of Gerald Barry’s operatic adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s celebrated satire. It’s a first for…
Author: David Truslove
Exceptional Singing within an Unexceptional Staging of Macbeth from Longborough Festival Opera
The operas of Guiseppe Verdi have had an intermittent presence at Longborough over the last twenty-eight years with only Falstaff, La Traviata and Rigoletto making the cut. Now, Macbeth – the composer’s first foray into…
Britten’s Billy Budd Sails into Glyndebourne for a Magnificent Revival
If the English Channel is some dozen or so miles away from Glyndebourne, one can still sense the proximity of the sea in Britten’s nautical masterpiece that is Billy Budd. In…
An Incomparable Tatyana in Grange Festival’s Eugene Onegin
Drawn from Alexander Pushkin’s 1833 novel-in-verse Eugene Onegin, Tchaikovsky’s eponymous opera could have been called after its heroine Tatyana Larin. Judging by this magnificent production and some compelling performances, I suspect Tchaikovsky…
An Impressive Ring Cycle Opener from Grange Park Opera’s Das Rheingold
It takes some nerve to initiate a Ring cycle in a country house setting with relatively modest resources in comparison to the major opera companies. But this is Wasfi Kani…
Charity Begins at Grange Festival for Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito
With its accumulating drama and superbly sung set pieces, this account of Mozart’s 1791 operatic farewell gave every reason why it should be heard more often, whether in fully staged…
Impressive Singing Relieves an Austere Don Carlo from Grange Park Opera
First presented in 2016 and now revived twice at Grange Park’s West Horsley address, this Don Carlo retains all of Verdi’s dark solemnities, and with Jo Davies’ removal of the original Fontainebleau scenes,…
Opéra Bastille’s La Traviata Leap Frogs into the Digital Age
With its cinematic scene changes and explosion of colour, this latest revival of Simon Stone’s Traviata reminded me of Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 film version of Romeo and Juliet. If that was intended to…
Magnificent Singing and Intermittent Humour from Palais Garnier’s La Cenerentola
According to the publicity for this latest revival of La Cenerentola at Palais Garnier, first unveiled in 2017, Guillaume Gallienne sets the work in Naples and situates the characters “on the edge…
Entertainment & Heartbreak at Garsington’s Der Rosenkavalier
Time as a great healer or gentle eraser is a large part of Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier. If musing on transience and ageing are prevailing themes, that’s neatly balanced by the light…