Opera
As camp as Christmas
Whoosh! A digital starburst, a sweep of orchestral sound and the stage of the Coliseum is alive with dancing, whirling…
Towering achievement
The screw may twist and the rack may turn: the Tower of London, in Jo Davies’s new production of The…
But what about the plot?
You wouldn’t like Tamerlano when he’s angry. ‘My heart seethes with rage,’ he sings, in Act III of Handel’s opera…
More depravity, please
The first night of the new season at Covent Garden was cancelled when the solemn news came through. The second…
Joyous freefall
The first part of the adventure was getting there. Out of the subway, past the tower blocks and under the…
Clangers and colanders
Delius and Puccini: how’s that for an operatic odd couple? Delius, that most faded of British masters, now remembered largely…
Let them drink fizz
There are composers who are known for a single opera, and there are operas that are known for only a…
More melancholy, please
The Yeomen of the Guard has been called the ‘English Meistersinger’ but the more you think about that, the dafter…
Naughty but very nice
Sir David Pountney, it appears, has been to Prague. He’s booked himself a mini-break, he’s EasyJetted out, and after (one…
Bathed in molten glory
When Parsifal finally returns to Montsalvat, it’s Good Friday. He’s trodden the path of suffering but now the sun is…
Sea fever
You’ve got to hand it to Dame Ethel Smyth. Working in an era when to be a British composer implied…
Literally Hitler
To be a Wagnerite is to enter the theatre in a state of paranoia. Mainstream culture has decided that Wagner…
Great Britten
No question, the Royal Opera is on a roll. Just look at the cast list alone for Deborah Warner’s new…
Star power and spectacle
London felt like its old self on Friday night. Possibly it was just me; when you visit the capital once…
Pot-washers and pole-dancers
The Royal Opera has come over all baroque. In the Linbury Theatre, they’re hosting Irish National Opera’s production of Vivaldi’s…
Showtime
Until 1881, HMS Pinafore was the second-longest-running show in West End history. Within a year of its première it had…
Stepmother superior
Leos Janacek cared about words. He’d hang about central Brno, notebook in hand, eavesdropping on conversations and trying to capture…
Such sweet sorrow
‘It’s generally agreed that in contemporary practice, this opera proposes significant ethical and cultural problems,’ says the director Lindy Hume…
Grateful for large mercies
Glyndebourne is nothing if not honest. ‘In response to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions our 2021 performances of Tristan und Isolde…
Springtime for Putin
Alexander Litvinenko lies in a London hospital, dying of polonium poisoning. That photograph from 2006 haunts the memory: the medical…
Too bawdy for the Beeb
Malcolm Arnold composed his opera The Dancing Master in 1952 for BBC television. It never appeared, the problem being the…
Bring me sunshine
Comedy’s a funny thing. No, seriously, the business of making people laugh is as fragile, as mercurial as cryptocurrency —…
Spelling disaster
When you think of Handel’s Amadigi (in so far as anyone thinks about the composer’s rarely staged, also-ran London score…
Tsar quality
There are worse inconveniences than having to wear a face mask to the opera. But there’s one consequence that hadn’t…
