Offenbach
More depravity, please: Salome, at the Royal Opera House, reviewed
The first night of the new season at Covent Garden was cancelled when the solemn news came through. The second…
Opera della Luna is a little miracle: Curtain Raisers at Wilton’s Music Hall reviewed
Arthur Sullivan knew better than to mess with a winning formula. ‘Cox and Box, based on J. Maddison Morton’s farce…
A silly, bouncy delight: Glyndebourne's In the Market for Love reviewed
Offenbach at Glyndebourne! Short of Die Soldaten with a picnic break or a period-instrument revival of Jerry Springer: The Opera,…
The joy of going to a real concert: OHP's Heart of Delight reviewed
I went to a concert! Not a livestream or download: a real concert, with real musicians, a real conductor, a…
More misogynistic than the original: ENO’s Orpheus in the Underworld reviewed
It’s Act Three of Emma Rice’s new production of Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld, and Eurydice (Mary Bevan) is trapped…
Can an Offenbach production be too silly? Garsington’s Fantasio reviewed
The tears of a clown have often fallen on fertile operatic ground. Think of Rigoletto and I Pagliacci; or The…
Unlikely to win converts: Royal Opera's L'Étoile reviewed
It’s widely agreed that the most difficult form of opera to bring off is operetta, whether of the Austro-German or…
I doubt Goethe intended Werther's sorrows to be as unremitting as this
There are some things the French do better than everyone else. Cheese, military defeats and extra-marital affairs are a given,…
