Opera
David Nice
In fact it was the Namur Chamber Choir which had the lion's share of the most striking music, transcending pretty hymns of celebration to conjure up for us the dark magicians who create the tripartite chimera, striking haut-contre tenors crowning their sombre harmonies, and then the fearful people of monster-ravaged Lycia. For these alone Rousset deserves the royal crown for resurrecting a score that disappeared from sight after 1773, its last court flourish following the 1679 premiere in the Academie Royale de Musique. It's not just the similarities with the myth of Idomeneo that made me Read more ...
igor.toronyilalic
The double standards in opera are amazing. If heldentenor Johan Botha - a man the size of a small Eastern European country - had been a woman, he would have been refused re-entry to the stage till he'd had a gastric band fitted. But his size was the least of our worries. For those of us who vainly cling to the idea of opera as a viable dramatic art form, Botha's return to Covent Garden as Tannhäuser was one of the most profoundly depressing experiences of my life.For most of the first two acts Botha might as well have been a stuffed bear on wheels. He paced from stage right to Read more ...
igor.toronyilalic
Classical music does not get any cooler than mezzo Vesselina Kasarova. She jived. She grooved. She shuffled. She shimmied. She possessed the Barbican stage last night, an awesome black jumpsuit hanging off her rangy, kinetic figure, her neck sliding about like an Indian dancer's, her feet (in kitten heels) spinning like a jazzer's, her bullying arms posturing and prodding, her mouth flashing its whites like a primate's. Her voice? Extraordinarily weird, moving, honest, explosive. Her Sta nell'Ircana was a theatrical moment of the year. It wasn't all about Kasarova's Ruggiero, Read more ...
David Nice
Events surrounding the birth of the unrepentantly "un-American" Marc Blitzstein's early (1936-7) shot at socially aware music-theatre prove much more interesting than the show itself. Heck, I got more out of reading the programme than I did sitting through the whole darned thing. Let's face it, Blitzstein's mostly foursquare marriage of words and music sucks. Not that the dynamic Mehmet Ergen's latest Arcola team didn't give it their best shot.
The Cradle Will Rock, you see, has as fascinating a history as its classically trained, pianistically gifted and homosexual creator (and you may Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
A problem child in any number of ways, Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail doesn’t always get the professional attention it deserves, certainly not from London companies. The opera’s last outing at the Royal Opera House dates back almost a decade, and you’d have to look even further back to find it in English National Opera’s performing catalogue. If a director manages to get past the knotty Orientalist issues of staging then there are those of the dialogue, not to mention two of Mozart’s most taxing vocal roles in Belmonte and Konstanze. All of which places the focus firmly onto semi- Read more ...
josh.spero
From Rufus Wainwright's first album, which featured the dirgey "Damned Ladies" wherein he sings to Desdemona and "brown-eyed Tosca", his operatic musical tendencies - indeed, his whole operatic self-conception - have never been latent. He has always been a diva trapped in mortal form.So imagine the joy when a mailshot from the Royal Opera House arrived in inboxes across the world on Monday morning telling us that from Tuesday at 9am, we could book tickets to see Rufus doing a five-night stand - "velvet, glamour and guilt" - at Covent Garden next July. Two nights will be recreating his Read more ...
simon.mcburney
For anyone who grew up in the former Soviet Union, Heart of a Dog is a seminal text. But it’s also in the great tradition of Gogol and all the Russian satirists. It springs out into absolutely delicious flights of fantasy, but really sharp-edged. The mixture is there in Ostrovsky too: both very dark and very funny and also suddenly beautifully poetic. The theme of the piece is the manipulation of people, about the way that in 1926, after the new economic miracle, Stalin has come into power and a lot of people realise that something is turning sour. It’s like when we got New Labour and people Read more ...
David Nice
From discreetly poisoned violets at Covent Garden to buckets of man-dog blood in St Martin’s Lane has been quite a leap this week. True, the bourgeois plastic surgeon of Mikhail Bulgakov’s scabrous, long-suppressed 1925 novella goes about singing Aida while implanting testes and pituitary glands. But such melodies are only satirical snippets in Alexander Raskatov’s febrile newish score. And that needs the jumpy fantasias of Complicite style, not the lavish historical realism of David McVicar: which means both ENO and the Royal Opera are currently excelling in what they do best.For make no Read more ...
edward.seckerson
It has been said that making money is music to the ears of any entrepreneur. In the case of Ian Rosenblatt you might need to turn that concept on its head. The music itself is his passion and the financial losses he routinely absorbs in pursuit of musical excellence is for him a small price worth paying. Well, not so small actually: through Rosenblatt Solicitors - his prestigious City law firm - he spends around £400,000 a year financing the Rosenblatt Recital Series, a now internationally recognised platform for up-and-coming operatic talent. Major young singers of today, stars of tomorrow. Read more ...
David Nice
In the event, Covent Garden's first glitzy star vehicle of the current season turned out to be a handsome ensemble piece, with three of the four leads bringing special gifts (though not quite the full picture) to their stagey roles, tender and nuanced yet less than ideally pacy conducting from Mark Elder and about as much interpretation and telling mise-en-scènes from director David McVicar as the piece can reasonably take.Fans of tenor Jonas Kaufmann, and they are growing with good reason by the day, will no doubt tell you that he stole the show. Not exactly. His character, Maurizio, Count Read more ...
David Nice
The great American mezzo has died aged 79. As with every loss this year, it's been an opportunity to rediscover a legacy on CDs and on YouTube. The Verdi tigresses were Verrett's core stamping ground, and I've already posted on my blog a film of her Eboli in Don Carlo - a role which shows off her redoubtable chest voice to perfection - as well as a surprise appearance when Trevor Nunn's production of Carousel went to America. This, which I've come across thanks to fellow opera-loving bloggers, is another dose of sunshine to celebrate a remarkable singer.
Find Shirley Verrett's recordings and Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
Theatricality has always been English National Opera’s go-to manoeuvre, the uppercut to the jaw of heavyweight international vocal talent up the road at Covent Garden. The witty provocations of last year’s Le Grand Macabre and even the bizarre excess of Rupert Goold’s Turandot upped the stakes, presenting this season’s directors with something of a challenge. Borrowing first from the world of the West End musical, ENO opted for Des McAnuff’s rather limp Faust. Now, looking to theatre and the edgy talent of Rufus Norris, comes a Don Giovanni electric with iconoclastic, if occasionally Read more ...