Opera Reviews
Hänsel und Gretel, Royal OperaFriday, 24 December 2010
Fairy tales are fear tales really, the sweetening (and sharpening) of every child’s worst nightmares, emotions long buried in adulthood but very easily tapped back into with good theatre productions. The Witch in Hansel and Gretel should be the queen of the team of the ogres who lurk in forests or homes waiting to kill children, along with lieutenants the Wolf in Red Riding Hood, Snow White’s wicked stepmother and Carabosse in The Sleeping Beauty. Read more...
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Bellérophon in Concert, Les Talens Lyriques, Rousset, VersaillesSunday, 19 December 2010
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Tannhäuser, Royal OperaSunday, 12 December 2010
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. |
Handel's Alcina, BarbicanSunday, 05 December 2010
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...
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The Cradle Will Rock, Arcola TheatreFriday, 26 November 2010
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. Read more... |
Die Entführung aus dem Serail, OAE, Queen Elizabeth HallWednesday, 24 November 2010
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... Read more... |
A Dog's Heart, English National OperaSunday, 21 November 2010
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