Spain is ‘a country of death, a country open to death’ once declared the poet and playwright Federico García Lorca. It’s an assertion that provides a foretaste of Ainadamar, Osvaldo…
Tag: Welsh National Opera
Visually arresting Candide from Welsh National Opera
In the light of today’s cultural, financial and social turmoil, Welsh National Opera’s new production of Leonard Bernstein’s Candide is just the sort of tonic everyone needs. If its overworked…
WNO’s radical Magic Flute misfires
Out with the old and in with the new is the modus operandi for aspiring operatic directors. In this new production of The Magic Flute Daisy Evans takes her prerogative…
WNO’s La bohème at the Birmingham Hippodrome
Annabel Arden’s production of La bohème is ten years old now, but somehow I’ve contrived not to encounter it during my visits to the Birmingham Hippodrome during the last decade. …
Mortality and meaning: Welsh National Opera’s superb Makropulos Case at the Birmingham Hippodrome
Elina Makropulos, the ‘heroine’ of Leoš Janáček’s 1925 opera The Makropulos Case (Věc Makropulos), has been alive for 337 years, her longevity prolonged by an experimental potion given to her…
Welsh National Opera’s The Makropulos Affair: a magnificent achievement
The question of why we should crave immortality is central to Janáček’s penultimate opera. As a composer he defied old bones and enjoyed an Indian summer, finding recognition during his…
Handel Jephtha, Welsh National Opera
Welsh National Opera have revived Katie Mitchell’s 2003 production of Handel’s Jephtha, with Robert Murray in the title role and a new focus for the drama.
Beatrice and Benedict at the Wales Millennium Centre
Welsh National Opera presented a rather undercooked account of Berlioz’s tricky opera, in a revival of Elijah Moshinsky’s classic production