Lohengrin, Bayreuth Festival, July 2011

The people of Brabant as rats, Elsa in white, wounded with arrows in her back, and Lohengrin during the overture trying to get through white double doors. In 2010 this was the new production that opened the festival — it apparently got a mixed reception, but seeing it for the first time this year I liked it! And so presumably did Angela Merkel who returned as a private citizen to see it again, sitting in the first few rows rather than the main box at the back.

The Wedding, all photos Bayreuther Festspiele/Enrico Nawrath

The video projections of rats fighting and metaphorically trying to take over the kingdom were clever, and I loved the opening of Act II with a dead horse and overturned carriage. Telramund and Ortud were evidently trying to abscond with boxes of gold bars that the rats quickly made off with. They have failed in their attempt to take over the kingdom, and the wrecked carriage is representative of their wrecked plans.

Elsa, with Ortrud, Telramund and Lohengrin

As for Lohengrin himself, Wagner writes in his Mitteilung an meine Freunde (Communication to my friends) that the hero is looking for a woman who “ihn unbedingt liebe” (loves him unconditionally). He longs for the one person who can release him from his solitude, quench his yearning — for love, for being loved, for being understood through love (original German “ihn aus seiner Einsamkeit erlösen, seine Sehnsucht stillen konnte — nach Liebe, nach Geliebtsein, nach Verstandensein durch die Liebe“). He fails of course because Elsa cannot resist demanding the name he can’t reveal without returning immediately to the land of the Grail. When the swan comes back for him, it turns into Elsa’s lost younger brother whom Ortrud bewitched and accused her of murdering, and in this production the brother is an embryo held inside an egg-like container. He rises onto his legs, tears his umbilical cord, and stands there like some far eastern holy man. Lohengrin walked slowly to the front of the stage, the lights went out, and the applause erupted.

Elsa and Ortrud

Klaus Florian Vogt was an immensely strong and charismatic Lohengrin, assertive against others, yet showing quieter tender moments to the beautiful Elsa of Annette Dasch. Tómas Tómasson sang strongly as Telramund, and Petra Lang was a powerful presence as Ortrud, singing with huge force when the occasion demanded it. Samuel Youn was in good voice and whacky costume as the Herald, and Georg Zeppenfeld showed suitable weakness as King Henry, but sang with firmness, particularly in Act I when he refers to the sword giving a judgement between Trug und Wahreheit (fraud and truth).

The final tableau

Andris Nelsons conducted with energy and what seemed a faster than usual tempo, though I’ve no objection to that since I find this opera can tend to drag despite the beautiful music. In any event, Hans Neuenfels’ production, with costume and stage designs by Reinhard von der Thannen, gives a forward movement to developments and lightens things with a strong splash of colour. I loved the pink mice, and the hugely colourful lady rats at the wedding ceremony. As the mice came on, followed by the ladies I half expected the orchestra to burst into ballet music for Nutcracker or La fille mal gardée, to say nothing of the allusion to Swan Lake with Elsa and Ortrud in their feathered dresses of white and black.

In the end what stands out is: an intriguing production, fine performances from the whole cast, and that wonderful stage moment with the broken carriage and dead horse at the start of Act II. Super.

Tannhäuser, Bayreuth, July 2011

What fun this was at the end! The production team were booed to the rafters with not a handclap to be heard, and Stephanie Friede as Venus was so roundly booed she didn’t return for her second curtain call. What a relief to cheer the chorus, along with Michael Nagy’s beautifully sung Wolfram, and Günter Groissböck’s powerful voice and presence as Hermann the Landgraf.

All photos Bayreuther Festspiele/Enrico Nawrath

Bayreuth is celebrating its 100^th festival, delighting the management if not the audience by opening with another extraordinary production, this one by 42-year old Sebastian Baumgarten. His Konzept — and directors’ concepts are of the essence here — is that Tannhäuser is a huge experiment, reflecting the idea that the hero is experimenting with excess and its subsequent rejection. An audience on stage observes everything, and apparently Baumgarten wanted to run it without intervals. Thankfully the caterers objected, so he settled for the stage audience staying in place while the real audience left and the experiment continued. But anyone who thought they could stay to watch was soon ejected because that’s the way they do it in Bayreuth — the auditorium is emptied and the doors locked.

The Venusberg

The Venusberg is a cage with ape-men and various animals, including three giant tadpoles — could these be the three Graces who intervene to halt the ever more frantic proceedings? When it descends below stage we see three huge chemical processing plants in red, green and blue. Bold colours and big designs by Joep van Lieshout, but one gets lost in the details. The Act I shepherd in yellow trousers and white shirt is drunk, and reappears in the same state at the song contest of Act II where scantily dressed girls in knickers and stockings, with holsters on their belts, occasionally enjoy caresses with one another, and the pregnant Venus comes to watch proceedings. After going up to a high gantry and throwing water onto Wolfram and Biterolf as they’re singing, Tannhäuser holds Venus centre stage, and Elisabeth slashes her wrists.

Elisabeth at the Act II Song Contest

Video projections continued throughout, and one of a young woman operating machinery suddenly reminded me of the Nazi period. Perhaps that was my imagination, yet in Act III Wolfram accompanies Elisabeth to the huge BIOGAS cylinder and locks her in. “Kinder schaff’ Neues” (Children do something new) said Wagner, but did he really mean them to alter his dramas in this way? Elisabeth represents a pure type of love, and Wolfram adores her, yet he apparently murders her and sings O du mein holder Abendstern (Oh you my precious evening star) to the pregnant Venus, whose baby is passed round among the chorus ladies at the end.

Stage audience, Tannhäuser, Venus and tadpole in Act I

Yes, this is still Tannhäuser. Words and music remain Wagner’s, and conductor Thomas Hengelbrock gave us thrilling crescendos in the prelude to Act III. Production concepts notwithstanding, Lars Cleveman in his many costumes sang strongly as Tannhäuser, and Camilla Nylund made an attractive Elizabeth, with Michael Nagy and Günther Groissböck as Wolfram and the Landgraf giving the performance real vocal heft.

Ironically there really is a great experiment going on in Europe at present. It’s the Euro, and two of its gods sat a few rows behind us in a box — I refer to Angela Merkel and Jean-Claude Trichet. What they made of this I don’t know, but it’s now the Greeks who have been metaphorically in the Venusberg, and are trying to gain redemption. Tannhäuser was denied it in Rome, and it took a miracle from on high, yet he dies in the end.

Siegfried, Longborough Festival Opera, July 2011

The first act of this opera is long, and can sometimes drag with a middle-aged Siegfried mocking his guardian Mime before finally re-forging the mighty sword. One can yearn for Act II where Alberich and Fafner reappear from earlier in the Ring, but here at Longborough I wouldn’t have wanted Act I to last a minute less, because Daniel Brenna and Colin Judson were riveting as Siegfried and Mime.

Colin Judson as Mime, all photos by Clive Barda

It seemed incredible that a mere twenty-something could be singing Siegfried, though Daniel Brenna is in fact in his early to mid-forties despite his brilliant portrayal of a rambunctious young man. His enunciation of the words was so strikingly good that I needed no surtitles — it was as though he were merely speaking, yet with excellent pitch and an admirable heroic tone. Colin Judson was equally superb in his portrayal of the insecure and dissimulating dwarf Mime. Of course he deserves to die in Act II after inadvertently expressing his true feelings, but from a vocal point of view I was sorry to see him go.

The Act I set with its huge circular furnace door makes a strong impression, and in forging the sword, Siegfried hammered like a percussionist with fine musical effect. Wotan even makes a silent appearance as the Wanderer before coming back to converse with Mime whose inane questioning reminded me of a recent Commons enquiry, though at least Mime forfeits his head when he can’t answer the one question he himself should have asked.

Phillip Joll in Act I

As the Wanderer, Phillip Joll showed power and gravitas, particularly in his Act II dialogue with Nicholas Folwell’s strongly sung Alberich, and when he wakes Fafner, we hear the deep voice of Julian Close who will cover the same role at the Metropolitan Opera next season. I like Fafner’s appearance in this production, in scaffolding with headlights, I like his dying as a mere mortal, and I like the woodbird in her pretty skirt and flighty movements, delightfully sung by Allison Bell. But the main attraction in Act II was Siegfried himself. His soliloquy when he muses about his mother is one I’ve heard beautifully sung before, but Daniel Brenna gave it a real sense of emotion, particularly in his crescendo on the word Mutter when he wishes he could see her.

Daniel Brenna and Alwyn Mellor

In her Act III portrayal of Erda, Evelyn Krahe’s slow movements and almost ghostly appearance, helped give a sense of power to the role, adding to the other well-judged and well-timed stage movements in Alan Privett’s production, with choreography by Suzanne Firth. In the final scene with Siegfried, Alwyn Mellor showed immense power and presence as Brünnhilde, and although Longborough has only 500 seats, she will sing the same role in The Ring at Seattle in 2013, in an auditorium for 2,500. The orchestra of about 65 members played Wagner’s music beautifully under the sensitive direction of Anthony Negus, and I loved the horn calls in Act II. Congratulations to Longborough for following up last year’s Walküre, and I can’t wait for Götterdämmerung next summer, to say nothing of the whole Ring in Wagner’s bicentenary year of 2013.

Performances continue until July 30 — for details click here.

William Tell, in concert, Prom 2, Royal Albert Hall, July 2011

This opera is Rossini’s last, fulfilling a commission for a grand opera made five years earlier when he took up residence in Paris. The press had been buzzing with information on its progress, and in his book on Rossini, Francis Toye tells us that “On August 3^rd, 1829, it was finally produced before an audience bursting with curiosity. …  boxes were said to have changed hands for as much as five hundred francs … [and] though [it] was hailed with a salvo of applause by every musician and critic of note, the public remained comparatively indifferent, judging the opera as a whole to be long, cold and boring”. It is long — nearly four hours of music — and usually sustains various cuts. This performance was no exception, but it was gloriously played and sung by the Orchestra and Chorus of the Academy of Santa Cecilia, Rome, conducted by their music director Antonio Pappano, who also directs our own Royal Opera at Covent Garden.

William Tell is a legendary archer, forced to shoot an apple placed on his son’s head, and the opera is based on Schiller’s 1804 play, in which Tell’s actions help inspire a successful insurrection against Austrian rule. Whether he and his nemesis, the tyrannical Austrian reeve, Gessler, really existed is an open question, and the story of an archer who was compelled to shoot an apple from his son’s head goes back to a Danish tale in the Gestae Danorum (Deeds of the Danes) written by Saxo Grammaticus in the late twelfth century, in which the archer was named Toke, and the oppressor was King Harald Bluetooth. As in the Tell story the archer takes two arrows from his quiver and after succeeding with the first one is asked the meaning of the second one. He responds that if the first one killed his son, the second was for the oppressor himself, and he’s then condemned to death.

Historically it’s a fact that in 1273, Rudolf I of Habsburg revoked the Reichsfreiheit enjoyed by the Cantons of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden, and there was a tradition that William Tell’s insurrection took place in the early 14^th century. He’s a local hero, and in 1895 a bronze statue to him was erected in Altdorf, the capital of Uri.

The Schiller drama includes an important love interest. The young Arnold, a friend of Tell, is in love with Princess Mathilde of Habsburg, and sympathetic to Austria as a consequence. But learning that Gessler has killed his father he joins the rebels, and after Tell and his son are condemned to death, Mathilde places the boy under her royal protection. The role of Arnold with its multitude of high notes is a difficult one, and was brilliantly sung by John Osborn, with a glorious heroic tinge to his voice. His opening Act IV aria Ne m’abandonne pas elicited justifiably huge applause. Tell’s son Jemmy was sung with great purity and clarity by Elena Xanthoudakis, and Mark Stone stood out in the baritone role of Leuthold, as did Nicolas Courjal in the bass role of Gessler. The other principals and soloists were all strong, and the chorus was magnificent. When they played the role of Swiss Confederates at the end of scene 2 in Act IV the audience gave them tremendous applause.

I find it ironic, not to say amusing, that this opera on freedom from oppression — whose last line is Liberté, redescends des cieux — was produced in Paris in 1829, the year before the second French revolution when the last Bourbon King of France was exiled. However, it went past the censor unscathed, though the Papal States were not as lenient, and as for northern Italy there was predictable trouble with the Austrian authorities — in Milan the hero became William Wallace, the oppressors were the English, and the scene with the apple was taken out.

Rossini’s music for William Tell is fascinating, and one can even see ways in which it foreshadows Wagner — certainly Wagner himself congratulated Rossini on this! It was much admired by other composers, and I’m delighted that Antonio Pappano has brought it to the Proms, and given us such a wonderful performance. The start of the overture with those five solo cellos, and the wonderful horn calls around the upper reaches of the auditorium in the first scene, were gripping. The audience loved it, and time seemed to fly, but what a pity there were so many empty seats.

Tosca, with Gheorghiu, Kaufmann, and Terfel, Royal Opera, Covent Garden, July 2011

The orchestra, under brilliant direction by Antonio Pappano, started with a bang and the tension kept up throughout. Lukas Jakobski made a strong entrance as the escaped prisoner Angelotti, and as he left, Jeremy White came on as a humble Sacristan followed by a madding crowd of children. All very good theatre, before Cavaradossi enters, climbs to his platform, and takes up his paints. Then as I was beginning to daydream I was pulled up short by the voice of a god — Jonas Kaufmann launching into Recondita armonia. This was . . . . well, words fail me. The performance suddenly hit a higher level. Kaufmann was fabulous, well matched by Angela Gheorghiu as Tosca, showing superb quiet notes. This was a woman in love with Cavaradossi, rather than a prima donna, and she kept up the almost understated portrayal throughout. It was very effective.

The Sacristan and children

In this Jonathan Kent production, Act I takes place on two levels and towards the end of the act, as Scarpia is singing near the Attavanti chapel, a crowd of people enter at the upper level. The lighting design by Mark Henderson works particularly well here, and watching the congregation, I noticed the bishop cross himself in time to the music. It’s only a small detail, but getting the details right help a performance come to life — and this was a performance to treasure.

Kaufmann and Terfel

Bryn Terfel’s portrayal of Scarpia showed him to be a thoroughly nasty piece of work, and at the start of Act II we see a man determined to pursue his prey, even though he serves a regime that’s about to fall to Napoleon’s forces. His soliloquies were beautifully delivered, yet when Spoletta — strongly sung by Hubert Francis — enters, Scarpia’s aggressive nature reasserts itself as he knocks the fellow over. Act II swept forward, and the dragging off of Cavaradossi after his Vittoria! Vittoria! was a hugely powerful moment. There were also lovely moments of silence, which helped raise the tension, such as when Ms. Gheorghiu launched into Vissi d’arte. After her beautiful rendering of this aria, Scarpia gave her a slow handclap — a nice touch. Her killing of him, her movements and her placing of the candles, was perfect and I had to remind myself this is an opera and she’s actually gearing everything to musical cues. It all seemed so real I wanted to tell her to get a move on and get away.

With E lucevan le stelle in Act III, Kaufmann started calmly, but by the time he hit the last line E non ho amato mai tanto la vita! (And never have I loved life so much!) his emotion flew from the stage to embrace the audience. The shots from the firing squad sounded like hell, and after Tosca jumped to her death, Spoletta calmly walked forward as the curtain comes down. The menace is still there, and one urgently waits for Napoleon’s forces to arrive.

Pappano’s conducting was nothing short of superb, and a more emotional evening one could not wish for. But one small thing occurred to me during Act I, a mere quibble with the libretto, and I only mention it for Tosca buffs. When Tosca and Cavaradossi agree to meet later she sings E luna piena (the moon is full), but Sardou sets his play specifically on 17 June 1800 when Napoleon’s forces have just won the battle of Marengo. Full moon was on 7 June that year, so the moon would be in the last quarter and have risen only an hour or two before dawn. Yes, I know . . . it’s artistic license, but I’ve never seen this mentioned before, so I thought it worth a comment.

There are only two performances with this cast, so beg, borrow or steal to get a ticket for the final performance on June 17 when the present run of Tosca will close — for more details click here.

Seven Angels, Royal Opera House, Linbury Studio, July 2011

At the entrance to the auditorium was a display of brochures by the Friends of the Earth, and an Energy Bill petition ready for signing. This is a story about the desecration of the environment, told in the form of gluttony and the abandonment of boundaries in the bringing up of a spoiled young prince.

Yet it’s supposedly based on Milton’s Paradise Lost, and the seven angels are lost, forgotten and abandoned by God, Satan, and Milton himself. They no longer know who or what they are, so they construct a story, and transform themselves into the characters of the story. This much can be understood by reading the programme, but while the singing was loud the words were not always helpful, and this earnest endeavour is without a clear development in Glyn Maxwell’s libretto or Luke Bedford’s music. Certainly the music is good, if somewhat sententious at times and lacking in tempo variations, but the staging with the orchestra behind the singers made it hard to hear quieter passages. For instance at one point in the second half, the sound of the singers flipping the pages of the books was louder than the music itself.

The prince gorges himself, all photos Alastair Muir

Ah, yes, the books. Sitting carefully upright against one another on stage they were tipped over like dominoes, a feature that eventually felt a bit tiresome, and in the second half the books were piled up to make a long wall across the front of the stage, blocking the orchestral sound for those of us in the front few rows, though the singers were heard very loudly indeed. The prince ate the pages of the books, and part of the stage opened out like a book in two different ways, one showing a flourishing tree, another showing a dead one. In the second half a gigantic book on the pile of regular books was opened to release silver helium balloons, later black ones, and later nothing at all.

Obviously a great deal of thought has gone into this production by John Fulljames, but nothing gripped me. There were lots of clever ideas, and the performers expressed huge emotion in their facial gestures, but this alone cannot create good theatre. That can only come from the internal structure of the composition, and perhaps this would work better as an oratorio with the orchestra communicating more directly with the audience.

Making an opera on the worthy but politically correct theme of environmental preservation — instigated, according to the programme, by a visit to the millennium seedbank at Wakehurst Place in West Sussex — is surely not easy, but it reminds me that composers of successful operas have often battled the poets who act as their librettists. The theatrical element is essential in opera, and I’m afraid I missed it here.

This work is performed by The Opera Group and the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group conducted by Nicholas Collon. It premiered four weeks ago at the CBSO Centre Birmingham, and there are two further performances at Covent Garden, on July 14 and 15 — for details click here.

Le Nozze di Figaro, Opera Holland Park, OHP, July 2011

I’ve never seen this before — not Figaro, I mean, but such extensive choreography, and I don’t just mean movement among the performers. There were chainé turns as servants enter and exit the stage, along with the occasional pas-de-deux, all very well rehearsed and executed. The Crazy Day is the other title for Beaumarchais’ original play, and this production by Liam Steel, who also did the choreography, certainly gave full rein to the craziness. There was a great deal of busy movement and kissing between servants during the overture, and when two women got together — one dressed as a man — I took this to indicate the libidinous nature of the Count’s household, though in fact the servant en travesti later turned out to be Cherubino.

Near the end of Act II, all photos by Fritz Curzon

For a lively production of Figaro with minimal but effective sets, one could hardly do better. The performers moved and so did the furniture. A legless dining table, occasional table, chair and decapitated mirror join in the choreography, and when someone needed to be seated, the chair helpfully moved into place. It was all rather fun, and Matthew Willis did a fine job in the orchestra pit, giving plenty of zip to Mozart’s music.

Elizabeth Llewellyn and Jane Harrington as the Countess and Susanna

As to the singing, when Elizabeth Llewellyn came on as the Countess in Act II, with her cavatina Porgi, amor asking for love, the whole performance went up a couple of notches. She was terrific, and her Act III soliloquy Dove sono i bei momenti when she laments the apparent loss of her husband’s affections was beautifully done. Jane Harrington gave a lively and strongly sung performance of Figaro’s fiancée Susanna, and George von Bergen, whom I remember as an excellent Macbeth in Bloch’s opera of that name two years ago, was an admirably solid presence as the Count. Matthew Hargreaves, who was an excellent Leporello in Holland Park’s Don Giovanni last year, gave a similar performance here as Figaro, but I felt he lacked the vocal depth and bearing this senior servant of the Count’s household should have. Hannah Pedley clearly relished her role as Cherubino, and Barbarina was prettily sung and played by Jaimee Marshall, who was also a very effective partner in one of the pas-de-deux. Lynton Black was an amusing Dr. Bartolo, with a brilliant facial tick when he finds that Figaro is his own son, Sarah Pring was excellent as his wife Marcellina, and Andrew Glover was a fine Don Basilio and Don Curzio.

By the time we were in Act IV it was fully dark outside and Colin Grenfell’s lighting on stage worked beautifully. There were even fireworks heard from afar, giving an effective end to The Crazy Day.

Performances continue every other day until July 16 — for details click here.

Cendrillon, Royal Opera, Covent Garden, July 2011

The solid-looking walls in this production carry the text of Perrault’s fairy tale Cinderella, as if to reassure us that our lovely heroine will indeed eventually get her prince. For there is delicious uncertainty in Act III of this Massenet opera when Cinderella’s nasty step-mother and sisters assure her that after the bold intruder made her rapid exit from the ball, the prince decisively rejected her.

Off to the ball, all photos by Bill Cooper

This is too much for her father, who notices her grief and finally finds the backbone to defy his wife. In a tender duet with his daughter he promises they will return to his country seat and leave this town where he’s seen her cheerfulness fade away. Rather than allow her father to share her pain, however, she decides to run away and die alone. Her plaintive soliloquy Adieu, mes souvenirs de joie was most beautifully sung by Joyce DiDonato, ending with quietly sweet regret. The woodland scene that follows was played among roofs and chimney pots, and it worked well as the fairy godmother conjures up a gradual recognition between Cinderella and her prince, most gloriously and strongly sung by Alice Coote. Their duet was fabulous.

Elves surrounding Cendrillon

Why do we not see this opera more often? Preliminary plans were made in 1896 at the Cavendish hotel on Jermyn Street when Massenet and his librettist Henri Cain were in London for the premiere of La Navarraise. Upon its completion three years later a lavish first production was given in Paris at the Opéra Comique and was a great success, yet its first UK production was not until 1928, and this is amazingly its first performance at Covent Garden. In this version of the Cinderella story by Massenet and Cain, the two young principal characters are portrayed as desperate, lost children, hence the musical reason for not casting a tenor as the prince, yet the most widely available recording at one time did precisely this, and as Rodney Milnes writes in the Grove Dictionary of Opera, “there is neither authority nor tradition for this reprehensible practice”. Could this be partly a reason for the neglect of this opera? To be sure, Massenet was viewed unkindly at one time as a composer of drawing room romances, reflecting the personal and intimate nature of many of his works, but failing to credit their well-organised dramatic element, and the composer’s uncanny ability to fit music to words in a way that seems utterly natural. Cinderella’s Vous êtes mon Prince Charmant is a delightful example. And then there is the wonderful orchestration, such as the off-stage use of a lute, viola d’amore and ‘glass flute’ for the entrance of Prince Charming in Act II. The orchestration of this scene even reminded me of the meeting between Octavian and Sophie in Strauss’s Rosenkavalier. Ballet lovers will also recognise some of the music from Kenneth MacMillan’s ballet Manon, which was arranged by Leighton Lucas to music entirely from Massenet’s works.

The prince kneels to Cendrillon, surrounded by her rivals

But this is an opera that needs to be seen rather than just heard, and Laurent Pelly’s production, first staged at the Santa Fe Opera in 2006, is superb. I love the set designs by Barbara de Limburg, the choreography by Laura Scozzi, and the unnatural fairy tale element expressed by those extraordinary red costumes designed by Pelly himself, along with the red make-up on the footmen, and the absurd derrière of Madame de la Haltière, the stepmother. She was gloriously performed by Ewa Podles who used her vast range of pitch to the full, giving us low notes that seemed to run along the floor of the stage.

The nasty sisters were vivaciously played by Madeleine Pierard and Kai Rüütel, both in the young artists programme, and Eglise Gutiérrez exhibited wonderful top notes as the fairy godmother. Jean-Philippe Lafont was a quietly engaging and immensely sympathetic father who gained vocal strength as the evening progressed, and I loved his gravelly tone. Altogether this was staged to perfection with a wonderful cast, and the fact that it is a co-production with Barcelona and the Theatre de la Monnaie in Brussels speaks for its international attraction. Well-known operas occasionally attract very odd and self-indulgent productions, but this relatively unknown work has been given the magical production it needs to engage us. Do not miss it, because although it will surely be revived, this is a terrific cast, with very fine musical direction from Bertrand de Billy.

There are only five further performances, the last being a matinée on July 16 — for details click here.

Rinaldo, Glyndebourne, July 2011

The Siege of Jerusalem in 1099 is represented here by public schoolboys versus St. Trinian’s. Hockey sticks against lacrosse sticks. Super fun, and a rather good background for all the youthful amour and magical manipulations that form the heart of this Handel opera. The main feature of the story is that Rinaldo is in love with Almirena, daughter of Goffredo, aka Godfrey of Bouillon, one of the military leaders of the First Crusade. After the expected success against the enemy, they will marry.

Argante and Armida, all photos by Bill Cooper

Alarmed at the prospect of losing, the Saracen chief, Argante, calls on the sorceress Armida for help, and she promises to remove Rinaldo from the battle. Her girls abduct Almirena, and attract Rinaldo onto a boat to find her, bringing him to Armida’s magic realm. She herself then appears as Almirena, and though she can’t fool Rinaldo she certainly deceives her beloved Argante who admits his passion for this new vision of femininity. This infuriates Armida, who finds herself falling for Rinaldo. Confusing perhaps, but it’s a rather clever trick of director Robert Carsen to play the whole thing in terms of schoolboys and girls, along with the odd teacher.

Armida and her girls

Armida herself, wonderfully sung by Brenda Rae, was a stunningly attractive teacher in a tight black rubber dress. Her pretty brunette pupils in their short skirts and fishnet tights also appear in floor length grey gymslips and blond hair, and at the beginning are clad in black robes and veiled in niqabs. Magical transformations are part of the plot, and their appearance with blond hair matched that of Almirena, who was charmingly sung by Anett Fritsch — she replaced Sandrine Piau whose absence was due to an injury. Armenian mezzo, Varduhi Abrahamyan made a very handsome Goffredo, with Sonia Prina as an excellently schoolboyish Rinaldo. Ms. Abrahamyan sang beautifully, gaining strength during the performance, and Ms. Prina exhibited a fine heroic timbre.

Tim Mead as Eustazio

Goffredo’s brother Eustazio was strongly sung by counter-tenor Tim Mead who fitted the role to perfection in this production, looking very much a sixth former. A second counter-tenor, William Towers sang well in the relatively minor role of the Christian magus. Countering this range of soprano to contralto voices is the bass role of Argante, superbly sung here by Luca Pisaroni. In the orchestra pit, Ottavio Dantone provided excellent direction to thirty musicians from the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, conducting and playing the harpsichord.

Rinaldo and Armida

This was Handel’s first Italian opera for the British stage, performed in 1711, and though there was a revised version in 1731, this was the original. It’s hugely enjoyable, and Robert Carson’s production was full of surprises and clever ideas. I loved the chalkboard drawings and maps that altered in a magical way, I loved the designs by Gideon Davy, and the subtle changes in lighting, designed by Carsen himself along with Peter van Praet. What the director has done, above all, is to give enormous clarity to this fantastical story, loosely based on Tasso’s sixteenth century epic poem Gerusalemme liberata. The modern setting provides a fine background on which to play the conflicting emotions and amorous desires of the participants, which after all form the main point of this delightful opera.

Performances continue until August 22 — for details click here.

Two Boys, English National Opera, ENO, London Coliseum, June 2011

New music, a new opera, and a thoroughly modern story: a teenage boy is stabbed in the heart, and another boy is arrested for the deed. If this sounds unpromising material, let me reassure you — I was riveted.

All photos by Richard Hubert Smith

The programme notes for new operas usually contain a detailed synopsis, so it’s refreshing to see one in which you’ve no idea what will happen. The complexity grows as the opera progresses, and we seem lost in a labyrinth of internet chat rooms with mysterious, needy and dangerous characters. Then there’s a detective who at the very beginning says, “Even senseless crime makes sense”, yet she too is puzzled. She lives with her elderly mother, who hobbles around on sticks, and tells her she should use more make-up, get her hair done, and lose some weight. In Act 2 the detective rushes home to her mother feeling guilty that she’s been so absent, working on the case, and sings of feeling she will one day die, “unsung, unloved and alone”. Her mother responds, “How do you think anyone gets what they want? They show what other people want”. And that’s it. Suddenly the detective sees how to unravel the whole mess.

A crucial scene in church, with Joseph Beesley and Nicky Spence

This is great theatre. But it’s also more than that. This is a wonderful opera — a co-production with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, who put together composer Nico Muhly and librettist Craig Lucas. The combination is inspired, and its realisation on stage by director Bartlett Sher, using projections and animation by Leo Warner, Mark Grimmer and Peter Stenhouse is quite remarkable. Their company did the wonderful projections and animations of pearl divers in the ENO’s new production of Pearl Fishers last year, but these are even better, and well served by Donald Holder’s lighting.

Anyone who has ever written out and delivered a talk or radio broadcast will know it’s essential to write it in spoken English, not written English. With an opera libretto this is far harder because the words will be sung to music, and we all know examples of operas, even by top rate composers where it doesn’t work well, yet Craig Lucas has done an exceptional job, and Nico Muhly’s music suits it perfectly. Internet chat rooms might seem a rather difficult thing to show the audience, particularly people like me who don’t even know what they are, but it’s all brilliantly done.

Heather Shipp, Nicky Spence and Susan Bickley in the foreground

We begin to get used to Brian as [A_Game], wonderfully sung by Nicky Spence, Rebecca and her brother Jake as [mindful16] and [GeekLand], both well portrayed by Mary Bevan and Jonathan McGovern, to say nothing of Aunt Fiona [agent_11e], strongly sung by Heather Shipp. Bass-baritone Robert Gleadow was powerfully threatening as Peter [peetr_69], Joseph Beesley was wonderful as the boy soprano, and above all there was Susan Bickley who gave a beautifully sung and superbly nuanced portrayal of the detective. She was well supported by a large cast of singers and other performers who worked extremely well together as a team. Conducting by Rumon Gamba brought out the details of Muhly’s intriguing music, reminding me of composers such as Britten, Adams and Glass, yet being unlike any of them.

The ENO does not recommend this opera for anyone under 16, but if you’re a parent or grandparent of teenagers, or even younger kids who use Facebook and internet chatrooms, this will make you think. There are some weird people out there, and we need artists of the calibre of Muhly and Lucas to create a theatrical event that not only brings us to think on these things, but entertains us into the bargain. If you compare the creators of this drama to some of the dullards who would allow dangerous nutcases to roam free — I’m thinking of a well known British case involving boys, which recently hit the news again — well … there’s no comparison. Life informs art, but this is a drama in which art can also inform life.

The production must cost an arm and a leg, presumably helped by being a joint project with the Met in New York, and we’re lucky to have the world premiere here in London. Don’t miss it.

Performances at the London Coliseum continue until July 8 — for details click here.