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Opera

Opera in Edinburgh: even the best Stravinsky can’t beat mediocre Mozart

While a first-rate performance of The Rake’s Progress can’t disguise the fact that it’s just an ingenious toy, a misconceived Figaro remains unsinkable

22 August 2015

9:00 AM

22 August 2015

9:00 AM

The Rake’s Progress

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

Le Nozze di Figaro

Festival Theatre, Edinburgh

Is Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress anything more than an exercise in style? ‘I will lace each aria into a tight corset,’ Stravinsky told Nicolas Nabokov, and for most of three acts that’s pretty much what he does, deftly fitting W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman’s libretto to a steadily chugging parade of his smartest, pertest neoclassical tricks.

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