Opera Reviews

Bluebeard's Castle & The 8th Door, Scottish Opera

David Kettle Monday, 03 April 2017

What to pair with Bluebeard’s Castle? It’s always a dilemma for opera companies. Something lightweight, even comic, provides contrast but also risks trivialising Bartók’s dark, symbolist drama. Something equally brooding risks submerging the audience into an evening of endless gloom.

Madama Butterfly, Royal Opera

David Nice Friday, 31 March 2017

"È un'immensa pietà" - "it's heartbreaking," rather than "it's a huge pity" - sings consul Sharpless of "Butterfly" Cio-Cio San's fatal belief that her American husband will return to her.

Comment

Alceste, Early Opera Company, Curnyn, Wigmore Hall

David Nice Thursday, 30 March 2017

A wife dies to save her husband; a hero goes to hell and back to retrieve her from the underworld.

Ormisda, St George's Hanover Square

alexandra Coghlan Wednesday, 29 March 2017

The annual London Handel Festival is dutifully working its way through every one of Handel’s operas in a cycle that will eventually take us from Alcina to Xerxes before, presumably, starting all over again.

The First Commandment, Classical Opera, St John’s Smith Square

Peter Quantrill Wednesday, 22 March 2017

Isn’t it funny? You wait ages for an opera by an eleven-year-old and then two turn up at once. The world’s feature journalists descended on Vienna at Christmas for a new take on Cinderella by Alma Deutscher. What they heard, for what it’s worth, was a precocious, glittery pastiche of Classical manners. Last night was the real deal.

Partenope, English National Opera

David Nice Thursday, 16 March 2017

It's time again for surrealist charades at the nothing-doing mansion. Christopher Alden's Handel is back at ENO, making inconsequentiality seem wondrous.

Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Royal Opera

David Nice Sunday, 12 March 2017

Recent British-based productions have taken Wagner's paean to creativity, the reconciliation of tradition and the individual talent, at face value.

Comment

The Winter's Tale, English National Opera

David Nice Tuesday, 28 February 2017

After a Royal Opera performance of Birtwistle's The Minotaur, a friend spotted Hans Werner Henze in the foyer and had the temerity to ask that annoying question "What did you think?" "Very competent and extremely well performed," came the reply.

Comment

Hansel and Gretel, Opera North

graham Rickson Monday, 27 February 2017

Opera North’s updated version of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel takes place in what looks like a down-at-heel Leeds housing estate, the titular siblings shown filming the story using simple domestic props and back projections. Quite how the impoverished pair have acquired a high-end video camera isn’t made clear; presumably the assorted boxes of Christmas decorations scattered around Giles Cadel’s spare set fell off the back of the same lorry.