Grant Doyle - Reviews

Review: Ruddigore, Opera North, Theatre Royal, Newcastle

2011-11-10T13:46:00.001Z

by Sarah E Scott, Evening Chronicle

IF you have an aversion to all things operatic may I heartily recommend this glorious portal.

Ruddigore is super-silly late Victorian Gilbert and Sullivan melodrama entranced into the 20s. The era of silent film goes beautifully with a story as subtle as a pair of fluorescent jodhpurs.

This is gothic sublime, melodrama fabulous. Forgive the over-long first act, with its clunky, archaic spoken words. Revel instead in the gorgeous, delicately seasoned overture (polite but heartfelt clapping for the orchestra under conductor John Wilson) with a witty silent, flickering film which firmly sets the 20s tone.

It is the men who get the best parts. We have the utterly winsome Grant Doyle as hero/antihero Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, who has understandably skittered away from his responsibility as a naughty Baronet of Ruddigore.

This doomed aristocrat must commit, every day a crime in a ‘conscientious and workmanlike fashion’, or risk an unbelievably painful death.

So Sir Ruthven has become Robin Oakapple and left his put-upon brother (a revellingly moustachioed Richard Burkhard as Sir Despard Murgatroyd) the daily burden of bad. Both performers are masters of lightning-quick enunciation and are gloriously funny. Their performances are an utter joy.

Ruddigore, at its best, is seriously wicked and heaps of fun despite the fact that the plot’s resolution has more holes than a spider’s boudoir. And let’s sweep over the fact that the most desirous female on stage is obviously a nutter – Heather Ship works wonders with the seemingly impossible role of sexy lunatic Mad Margaret.

The production values of this are particularly fine, what with all that subtle contrasted lighting and the portraits coming to life. The resurrected paintings represent the main reason this Gilbert and Sullivan gem has been shunned for so long.

Original review click here

Ruddigore: Opera North, 30th September 2011

2011-10-03T17:07:00.004+01:00

by Geoffrey Mogridge

Ruddigore - or the Witch's Curse - originally spelt Ruddygore and dubbed by W.S Gilbert himself as "Bloodybore", received mixed reviews by leading critics of the day. There can be little doubt that the piece suffered by comparison with the sustained brilliance of its immediate predecessor, The Mikado. Gilbert's dialogue for Ruddigore was dismissed by the New York Times critic as "amusing here and there" in the first act and as "slow and tedious" in the second.

Composer and librettist made adjustments and some cuts in the days following the 1887 premiere at London's Savoy Theatre before Ruddigore was taken off after a relatively short run of 288 performances. The piece was never revived during the lifetimes of its composer or author and did not return to the repertory of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company until December 1920, remaining in the Carte's touring repertory until the company's sad demise in 1982.

Opera North's production directed by Jo Davies and premiered last year under the baton of light music crusader John Wilson recreates the version of the musical score which both Gilbert and Sullivan finally settled upon. The company reckons that it is 120 years since this "definitive" version restoring Sullivan's orchestrations which had been tampered with prior to the 1920 revival, has been performed. Amongst re-instated musical numbers are the lovely duet for Rose Maybud and Richard Dauntless "The battle's roar is over", and "For happy the lily" (the "Basingstoke" patter finale) in the original 9/8 time.

Although the action has been updated from the period of the Napoleonic Wars to the aftermath of the First World War, the Victorian critics who slammed Gilbert's libretto would probably spin round in their graves to discover that it remains untouched more than 120 years later - save for the insertion of an additional verse in Sir Ruthven's song "All the crimes I find in The Times". The new text amusingly parodies the MPs' expenses scandal, tabloid journalism hacking, and the recent appearances of the wife of the Speaker of the House of Commons in Celebrity Big Brother!

Every syllable of the libretto, whether spoken or sung, is made to sound as fresh and witty as if the ink had barely dried on the manuscripts. Davies infuses her production with boundless energy and movement to counter any sense of dragging or slackening off, during the singing of musical numbers or protracted sections of spoken dialogue. For example, during her charming song "If somebody there chanced to be" the demure Rose Maybud sung by the delightful Amy Freston is required to up-end her bed to retrieve the precious Book of Etiquette from where it has been concealed by Rose's aunt, Dame Hannah. The critics who considered Act II to be slow and tedious would be delighted by the synergy which Davies has created; the scene in which the ghosts of the baronets of Ruddigore inquire into the crimes that the current Bad Baronet has committed is one of hilarious pandemonium as the ghosts, with much noise and bustle, re-arrange the furniture on stage to clear the space for the "inquiry". Davies also extracts abundant energy and humour from the repeated interventions of the corps of professional bridesmaids led by Gillene Herbert's feisty Zorah with the sopranos and altos of the Opera North Chorus. The ladies are required to rush around with predatory yelps and handfuls of confetti, besieging every potential bride and groom.

Conductor John Wilson and every member of the original cast have returned to reprise their performances: Grant Doyle's warm and well nourished baritone is a revelation to those of us brought up on much lighter voices in the dual role of Robin Oakapple and Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd. Doyle's delivery of the patter songs is just as razor sharp as the classic D'Oyly Carte principal comedians of yesteryear. Sir Despard Murgatroyd is sung by the wonderfully saturnine Richard Burkhard who with white face make -up, top hat and swirling cloak epitomises the villain of Victorian melodrama. His Act I entrance amidst the 1920s seaside paraphernalia of a Punch and Judy theatre is a masterstroke.

The nimble Hal Cazalet presents Richard Dauntless, the Man O' War's Man and foster-brother to Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd as a macho, tattooed lothario. Cazalet has a lovely lyric tenor, quite ravishing in The battle's roar is over" - effectively a love duet with Rose - and agile and flexible in his introductory number "I shipped, d'ye see, in a revenue sloop". This is vigorously choreographed by Kay Shepherd with some brightly dressed sailors turning cartwheels and Cazalet proving that he can dance a hornpipe with the best of them. The multi-tasking Amy Freston as Rose is in beautiful voice throughout, her phrasing is supple and the top notes immaculately placed. Richard Angas plays Robin's faithful retainer Old Adam Goodheart. The towering and sepulchral-toned Angas and Sir Ruthven open Act II in the heavy gothic atmosphere of the oak panelled baronial hall dominated by the ancestral picture gallery and a huge writing desk where they map-out the daily crime which Sir Ruthven is now cursed to commit. At one point, Angas staggers on wielding a huge axe and looking as though he's stepped from the pages of Edgar Allen Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher.

Heather Shipp creates a beautifully studied and spidery portrayal of Mad Margaret, not really mad but just a smidgeon unhinged and slightly unsettling. We first encounter Margaret wheeling her worldly possessions in a pram before singing her dramatic and poignant "mad" scene "Cheerily carols the lark" heralded by a beautiful flute solo. Anne-Marie Owens' plum pudding contralto voice is perfect for the "gorgon" role of the redoubtable Dame Hannah who becomes "Little Nannikins" in the touching duet "There grew a little flower and a great oak tree" with the fearsome ghost of Sir Roderic Murgatroyd sung by Steven Page who is dressed in army khaki as a First World War General. Page initially appears (and disappears) heavily robed and hooded like the Monk in Don Carlos and there's a clever illusion when he seems to vanish into thin air and the terrified Sir Ruthven is left holding the empty robes! Page's dark baritone and impeccable diction superbly intones "When the night wind howls" with the chorus of ghostly ancestors and cushioned by some of Sullivan's most vividly descriptive orchestral writing.

Sepia-tinted sets and costumes respectively created by Richard Hudson and Gabrielle Dalton with muted, atmospheric lighting designed by Anna Watson contribute to a production that is ravishing to behold. The silvery grey sea and pale blue sky for the Cornish coastal village in Act I imbue the scene with the quaint charm of a 1920s picture postcard resort. This, with the flying-in of oak pews and screens becomes the church for the extended finale to Act I. The picture gallery of Act II fills the full height of the proscenium and tapers to a point at the back of the stage inducing a feeling of claustrophobia as the ghostly ancestors of Ruddigore appear as if by magic behind the portraits amidst the obligatory lightning flashes and amplified rumbles of thunder.

Everything gels under the baton of John Wilson who clearly has the measure of Gilbert & Sullivan, like the great Sir Charles Mackerras before him. Wilson takes things at a brisk pace but is careful to shine light on detail and he meticulously delineates orchestral and vocal textures. I don't think that I have ever heard the Act I finale with so much inner detail, such as the intricately beautiful harmonies of the pseudo-madrigal "When the buds are blossoming" sung here with palpable joy by the entire company.

My only (small) criticism is that the lengthy overture needed pruning; this was set to "once upon a time" images and text recounting the legend of the Witch's Curse and projected onto the front-piece. Dame Hannah fully explains everything soon afterwards in her opening number "Sir Rupert Murgatroyd", sung with stentorian richness and firmness of tone by Anne-Marie Owens. A small carp which it seems almost churlish to mention because this terrific production of a hitherto under-rated Savoy opera oozes so much humour and visceral energy from an expert cast who now inhabit their roles. In fact it's ruddy marvellous!

Photographs (c): Robert Workman

Ruddigore, Opera North

2011-10-01T11:55:00.003+01:00

A slick, witty but affecting Gilbert and Sullivan revival

by Graham Rickson

One bad baronet: Richard Burkhard as Sir Despard Murgatroyd

Revived with almost indecent haste, Jo Davies’s 2010 production of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Ruddigore now feels even more polished and slick. Slickness is not a derogatory term here; this staging hits the spot in pretty much every way – musically, dramatically and visually.

Davies’s shrewdest move is to shift Gilbert’s creaky satire on the excesses of Victorian melodrama forward to the 1920s, a period now more closely associated with the genre – think silent cinema, big moustaches and shiny top hats. There are also several nice nods to 1930s horror films, and a witty sequence of scratchy slides shown just before the curtain rises. These give us the operetta’s back story – that of the cursed line of Murgatroyd baronets, each successive title holder condemned to commit a serious crime each day or face an agonising death. Structurally it’s an unbalanced work – Act One is overlong and too discursive, followed by a tighter second half which concludes nonsensically and a little too abruptly. The plot is full of holes. But it’s still very, very funny – watch this Ruddigore as a series of brilliant set pieces and you’ll leave the theatre immensely satisfied.

Davies’s teasing hints of the drama to come are so delicious that there’s a rather long wait before the action really kicks off – at the point where the villainous Sir Despard (a superb Richard Burkhard) makes his dastardly entrance through a Punch and Judy tent. His elder brother Ruthven, having faked his own death and now living quietly under an assumed name, is unmasked, leading to a beautifully choreographed wedding scene where he is suddenly forced to take on the cape, the cane and the top hat, abandoning his bride to be for a life of crime. Grant Doyle is a joy as the imposter, best of all in his scenes with his foster brother Dick Dauntless – especially during an extended sequence where he wins the attention of village sweetheart Rose Maybud by describing what Dick might really have been getting up to whilst at sea. Dick’s entrance leads to a nicely choreographed re-enactment of a French naval battle played out by flag waving bridesmaids (pictured above right). It’s marvellous to watch, and Hal Cazalet is as agile vocally as he is with his feet. Amy Freston as Rose convinces as a woman vainly trying to lead her life according to the advice contained in an etiquette manual, subtly unbuttoning and loosening up before our eyes.

Act Two’s technical challenges are surmounted with ease - notably the moment where the Murgatroyd portraits descend from their picture frames to harass Sir Ruthven, too mild-mannered to commit atrocities more serious than forging cheques. Richard Stilgoe has provided yet more updated lyrics – mentioning phone hacking, Greek debt and Sally Bercow. It’s gorgeously lit by Anna Watson – I’ve rarely seen outdoor skies look so natural. And it’s conducted by the remarkable, precocious John Wilson, lifting every rhythm and pacing each patter song to perfection. Bad Gilbert and Sullivan productions are pure torture. This one is lavish, affectionate and witty.

Ruddigore at the Grand Theatre Leeds until 27 October, then on tour to Nottingham, Newcastle, Salford and London

Link to original review here

Moby Dick: State Opera of South Australia

2011-09-17T15:32:00.003+01:00

Making an opera out of something that on the one hand is considered to be a great metaphysical novel and, on the other, is a massive book filled with specific detail about life on a 19^th century deep sea whaler, must represent something of a challenge. It comes as no surprise that Jake Heggie took some five years over Moby Dick, initially working with playwright Terrence McNally and then, after he withdrew, with librettist Gene Scheer.

The resulting work manages to suggest both aspects of the novel. It conveys the destructive quest of the obsessive Ahab for the white whale against the better interests and judgements of his crew (especially Starbuck) and its symbolic nature, and also hints at the nature of life on board the Pequod. Overall, Heggie and Scheer achieve this by concentrating on the delineation of a few key characters (compared to the 30 or so in the novel), and streamlining the narrative; there is for example only one instance of the ship pursuing a whale other than Moby Dick. It is a highly successful compression which embraces Melville’s themes within a clear narrative structure.

There is little place for a narrator in an opera; Melville’s famous opening line, “Call me Ishmael”, is missing, and the opera opens on board the ship. This character is known throughout as (the) Greenhorn, and only at the very end of the opera, as he floats, sole survivor, on Queequeg’s coffin, does he utter those words to his unseen rescuer, thus informing us of how the tale came to be told.
Excerpts from the book are chosen with care to illustrate its focus on the discourses which are central to it, such as the role of religion in the lives of men (sic), and the relationship of man to nature. In the opening scene, Ishmael/Greenhorn rants at Queequeg for praying to his god, affecting to despise all religion. Starbuck disparages Ahab’s quest for vengeance, declaring it madness to want revenge on a unreasoning animal, “to be enraged by a dumb thing”.

On first hearing, there is an almost perfect blend of words and music, but in a sense this leaves the music seeming somewhat unmemorable, almost like movie music. It is almost unfailingly melodic, with an appropriate use of bells, and much brass for stormy and climactic moments. There are hints of earlier works which may or may not be deliberate; the first, very robust chorus hints at the anvil chorus from Il Trovatore, and at other times one hears echoes of Strauss’s Elektra. There is certainly nothing you would come out humming, although maybe greater familiarity would rectify that.
The opera is a co-production between Dallas Opera, State Opera of South Australia, San Diego Opera, San Francisco Opera and Calgary Opera, appearing first in Dallas and now in Adelaide. The fine cast is international with an emphasis on Australian singers, but it must be said that the real star of the production is the production. This is modern technology used very intelligently, always to service the story. The opening scene is a scrim behind which points of light gradually appear and dart about, perhaps representing stars as they wheel and swell; lines of light begin to connect the points, and finally this resolves into the structure of a sailing ship (to applause from the audience) which solidifies into a solid setting of mast and riggings. Meanwhile light ethereal music sympathetically swells into a solid brass-led sound. Queequeg is discovered sitting at the front of the stage; the dark scrim rises, and white scrims descend and become the bottoms of the sails, and other sailors populate the ship’s deck.

The opera is structured in two Acts and an Epilogue. Act One, before an interval, comprises Day One (Scenes 1-4) and Day Two (Scenes 5-7) specified as taking place three months later. Act Two, after the interval, consists of Day Three (Scenes 1-3), one year later, and Day Four (Scenes 4-8) the next morning, after which comes the Epilogue, many days later.

The scenes at sea are quite brilliant. A very steeply raked stage provides perches for the men in the whale boats, which are projected around them in bright blue light over a turbulent darker blue sea effect. When they fall from the boats, they literally fall down the stage, into what appears to be foaming waves. After the successful chase, the processing of the whale takes place on a platform projected out from half way up this stage, behind which an opening frames a glowing red scene of a tripod with a chunk of flensed whale hanging behind it. On the platform the men are seen to deposit portions of whale blubber into the trypot. Another great vignette sees the sailors dancing to a version of the traditional sea shanty “Spanish Ladies”, their boisterous jollity degenerating into a fight.

The stunning effects are attributable to Projection Designer Elaine McCarthy originally, overseen in Adelaide by Shawn Boyle. The overall director is Leonard Foglia, with Robert Brill (Set Designer), Jane Greenwood (Costume Designer) and Donald Holder (Lighting Designer – Gavan Swift in Adelaide) contributing.

The soloists provided great singing and dramatic performances; as ever, SOSA has an excellent ear for casting. Ahab was sung with great ringing tone and suitable ferocity by American Heldentenor Jay Hunter Morris, his entrance heralded by the thud of his wooden leg. Adelaide-born Grant Doyle as Starbuck has a finely controlled baritone, used here to great effect as the rational but devout mate. His soliloquy was touchingly sung but perhaps a shade too long. His duet with Ahab on the other hand provides a lovely lyrical interlude on Day Four, as he almost persuades the demented captain to see the error of his ways. The role of Greenhorn/Ishmael is necessarily limited without his narrative function, but was well sung by young tenor James Egglestone. How fortunate to have available a Polynesian singer to portray Queequeg! Bass-baritone Jonathan Lemalu is of Samoan descent and well-known on the international stage; here he is almost unrecognizable, covered in tattoos, and anchoring the role firmly with his resonant voice. The sole female voice in the work is the young cabin boy, Pip, sung by Lorina Gore (last seen in very different persona in Bliss), providing a strong, clear and accurate soprano. A pity her tambourine was not in better visual sync with the one actually rattled in the pit. The rest of the cast provided strong support, as did the State Opera Gentlemen’s Chorus. Both chorus and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra were well-directed by Timothy Sexton, who is also Artistic Director of the State Opera of South Australia. All power to him for such a successful, electrifying and gratifying night at the opera.

Sandra Bowdler
Opera Britannia

Link to original review here

MOBY DICK - State Opera SA, Adelaide Festival Theatre

2011-08-29T16:07:00.001+01:00

Review by Tony Busch

Drop everything and book a ticket to this amazing production before its short season is over this week.

“Moby Dick” is a triumph. This epic American novel has been skilfully compacted to a perfect balance of dramatic action and human frailty, and then beautifully scored to produce a mesmerising evening of musical theatre. Forget any preconceptions you might have about opera being a dated or irrelevant art form or any fear that modern opera isn’t easy to listen to.

The production values are awesome. Director Leonard Foglia, set designer Robert Brill, projection designer Elaine McCarthy and costume designer Jane Greenwood have created a thoroughly involving and credible environment that brings the whaler Pequod alive and delivers the scale and epic dimension needed to make the drama work. Scene transitions are seamless. The two whaling sequences are superb as is the hot, harsh setting of rendering the whale blubber, which provides the background to the confrontation between Captain Ahab and First Mate Starbuck.

Jake Heggie’s music is lyrical and captivating and his orchestrations sublime, ranging from the translucent delicacy of plankton to leviathan climaxes. Gene Scheer’s libretto delivers not just a cohesive story but ample character development too.

The cast is uniformly brilliant.

Jay Hunter Morris is a driven Captain Ahab, a charismatic leader of men whose obsession with the white whale who took his leg brings disaster. It is a commanding performance.

He is perfectly matched by Grant Doyle as Starbuck, the lone voice of reason. His is a superb portrayal of a man caught in the cross-hairs of someone else’s fate and his Act 2 duet with Ahab is a highlight.

James Egglestone sings Greenhorn with warmth and sincerity and a beautiful legato line. Jonathan Lemalu is a mighty Queequeg. Byron Watson as Stubbs, Adam Goodburn as Flask and Douglas McNicol as Captain Gardiner all contribute wonderful performances. Lorina Gore makes a winning Cabin Boy, Pip, and her scene lost at sea is chilling.

The Chorus exceeds its usual impeccable standards with a particularly rich and lustrous sound. Indeed, the choruses are some of the highlights of the piece.

Conductor and Chorus Master Timothy Sexton is in total control of the brilliant Adelaide Symphony and extracts every nuance of musical colour from the score.

Bravo to all who had a hand in co-commissioning this work with the Dallas, San Diego, San Francisco and Calgary operas. It’s a production that all South Australian’s should be immensely proud of and one that no musical theatre lover should miss. So book a ticket now.

Link to original review here

OPERA: Moby Dick

2011-08-29T15:50:00.010+01:00

OPERA: Moby Dick

State Opera of SA

by GREG ELLIOTT

MOBY Dick is a triumph! Timothy Sexton, CEO of the State Opera of South Australia and conductor of Moby Dick, should feel very proud of this magnificent production: it is Jake Heggie’s latest opera and has been keenly anticipated since the outstanding success of Dead Man Walking.

From the soft, opening notes, the audience is drawn into Elaine McCarthy’s spectacular projections of the mysterious world of the sea. As the music and story grow in power and intensity, so do the visuals continue to engage and absorb us in this tale of Captain Ahab’s obsession with revenge on the enormous white whale that claimed his leg and destroyed his balance.

Composer Jake Heggie and lyricist Gene Scheer worked with director Leonard Foglia early in the creation of Moby Dick, and their successful collaboration has created a total and memorable experience. Robert Brill’s set is most impressive; it invites the audience to be on deck with the crew and allows the male chorus to do more than stand and deliver as they reach new heights when they exploit the many levels and positions on board.

The combination of set, adorned by the cast in tasteful mariner tableaux, with awe-inspiring projections creates breathtaking scenes.

Jonathan Lemalu, as Queequeg, sets the tone for the opera in his opening chanting and ritual; his deep, resonant singing fills the auditorium and we understand immediately there is more than one man’s journey that we will be experiencing in this performance.

Moby Dick is more than a whale hunt: it is a meeting of cultures, an exploration of character, and it plumbs the inner depths of the male psyche. This opera explores what motivates men, how they deal with trauma and dilemmas, and the very nature of revenge.

The cast is a tremendous blend of international and local talent: Jay Hunter Morris is an impressive presence as Captain Ahab, not only as the driven man who will not listen to his peers, but also as the reflective man who wonders what he has been and what he should be. There is interesting speculation about the place of God in this adventure and a comparison of a Christian with a pagan view of the world.

The various relationships between the crew are a fascination, and James Egglestone, as Greenhorn, captures the innocence and development of a raw sailor who experiences the best and worst of man’s nature. Grant Doyle, as Starbuck and second-in-command, stands strong against Ahab and their duets are powerful, spell-binding conflicts. Each of the supporting cast and chorus and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra make the most of every musical and theatrical moment of Jake Heggie’s superb score.

What an exciting city and time we live in that gives rise to an international collaboration that produces a modern masterpiece such as Moby Dick.

State Opera’s production of Moby Dick is as close as one could come to actually being on the Pequod and out on the open sea. It is a must for opera lovers and it is a brilliant initiation into the possibilities of modern opera for those unfamiliar with the genre.

Link to original review here

Moby Dick is at the Festival Theatre until September 3.

Classic adventure hits all operatic high notes

2011-08-29T12:02:00.014+01:00

by Ewart Shaw

THE lights go down. Stars appear, and there is the Pequod, out of Nantucket, ahuntin' the whale.

It is the mesmerising beginning to an astounding journey. The Great American Novel has become a grand new opera. Leviathan has been drawn out.


Grant Doyle as Starbuck with Jay Hunter Morris as Ahab.

Leonard Foglia has recreated his original Dallas Opera production with a first-rate crew and a superb orchestra for a thrilling and unforgettable theatrical experience.

The story unfolds with cinematic flair. Jake Heggie and his librettist, Gene Scheer, have distilled down the Melville tale, carefully balancing high drama with lighter relief, from the banter of the crew to the apocalyptic visions of judgment and revenge that drive Captain Ahab.

Heggie's music is melodious and sentimental; his writing for voices adept and gratifying, delivered by the cast with a care that renders the surtitles irrelevant.

Timothy Sexton draws out the lustrous colours of the score from the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, and the nearly 40-strong chorus is magnificent.

The first whale hunt is a tour de force with cabin boy Pip, Lorina Gore, singing suspended high above the stage. Starbuck's confrontation with Ahab is set against the butchering and boiling down of a whale carcass.
Jay Hunter Morris gives a fully rounded portrayal of Ahab, articulate and driven, but lacking a touch of madness the character requires.

Around him are some of the finest actor-singers you'll see in years. Grant Doyle as first mate Starbuck, in every moment, every gesture, communicates the depths of longing that fuel his spirit.
James Egglestone as Greenhorn is one of the finest young tenors around. His scenes with Queequeg, the imposing Jonathan Lemalu, are subtle and heartfelt.

Byron Watson as Stubb, Adam Goodburn as Flask, and the other crew are totally committed to this incredible adventure. Douglas McNicol, singing off-stage as the captain of another questing vessel brings real pathos to his brief lines.

It is a historic moment in the fortunes of State Opera, no longer just a point on the map of the opera world but a significant destination.

Link to original review here.

Moby Dick - State Opera of South Australia

2011-08-27T16:01:00.002+01:00

by Barry Lenny

Composer, Jake Heggie's, Dead Man Walking was a big hit with Adelaide audiences a few years ago and, judging by the response to the opening night performance, his latest opera is set to be an even bigger hit. Gene Scheer's libretto draws dialogue directly from Hermann Melville's 1851 novel. The opera was premièred by the Dallas Opera on 30^th April 2010 and, after this season, will then go to San Francisco Opera, San Diego Opera and Calgary Opera. It was jointly commissioned by these opera companies in conjunction with State Opera of SA.

The opera takes place aboard the three masted whaler, the Pequod, where Captain Ahab seeks the white whale, Moby Dick, that took his leg in a previous encounter. His obsession gives rise to conflicts with his crew and it is the interpersonal relationships between crew members that is what makes both the novel, and the opera, a classic.

As the overture begins a dot of light appears, then a few more, then more again until we we see a star-filled night sky. Lines appear, joining the dots into constellations and, as we recall the times when seamen used to stars to navigate by, the lines suddenly join together to form a whaler coming straight towards us over the waves, turning as it passes across our bows then, as the scrim curtain rises, the ship is recreated in the set behind it as we find ourselves on the deck of the Pequod. There could hardly be a more exciting and captivating start to an opera than this, and my description captures very little of the experience of actually seeing it happen. All this, and we are only a few minutes into the opera, with so much more to come.
The staging of this opera is remarkable with a set that finds people up to ten metres above the stage on an almost vertical wall, leaping off of their perches and sliding down to the ground when their boat capsizes, people climbing high above the stage into the rigging, the young cabin boy, Pip, having been thrown into the sea, swimming for his life in raging seas, whalers melting blubber in a cauldron to get oil, the fire so hot that it looks like a room in Hades, handfuls of men in small sea-boats harpooning whales, and so much more.
The seamless combination of projections, the physical set and live action is astounding, seeming to blend opera with theatre, circus, cinema and visual art into a multimedia extravaganza. It has to be seen to believed. If it were not for the power of the music and the superb performances it might have overwhelmed the production, but that did not happen, instead it became an equal part of a greater whole.

Set designer, Robert Brill, costume designer, Jane Greenwood, projection designer, Elaine McCarthy, lighting designer, Donald Holder, revival projection designer, Shawn Boyle and revival lighting designer, Gavan Swift make up the team responsible for the amazing visual side of this production. The visual side is not confined just to the physical set, but includes people, with choreographer, Keturah Stickann, and fight and action choreographer, Nino Pilla, adding more movement energy. They keep the cast and, especially, the fifteen supernumeraries very busy from start to finish, climbing all over the ropes and masts and sliding down the decks of the Pequod.

Right from the start, the darkly magnificent music, played by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra at their very best, conjured up images of people, places and events in Melville's powerful tale, working hand in glove with what we see and hear on stage. We first see Queequeg, the heavily tattooed cannibal from the South Seas island of Kokovoko, sitting and praying in his own language. Bass, Jonathon Lemalu, is everything you would want in the character of Queequeg, strong, quietly commanding, his superb voice echoing in very corner of the theatre.

His chant awakens Greenhorn (Ishmael), a role in which tenor, James Egglestone shines, bringing a complex and sympathetic portrayal of the first time whaler to the role. These two develop a deep friendship as Greenhorn questions his religion and finds a greater spirituality in the heathen religion of Queequeg. There are some wonderfully warm moments between these two. The first line of the novel “Call me Ishmael”; is the final line of the opera, sung with a great poignancy as Greenhorn clings to the floating coffin, prepared for Queequeg when it was thought that he was going to die.

Another pairing, with a far from warm relationship, is that between Captain Ahab and the first mate, Starbuck. Jay Hunter Morris stomps around on his peg-leg giving us a cold and calculating man whose single minded obsession is frighteningly displayed in his performance. He barely hides his insanity at the start, but it slowly reveals itself more and more as he gets closer to his quarry.

Grant Doyle shows us all of the pain and frustration that Starbuck feels as he tries to fight the Captain's insane chase, at the exclusion of all else, even attempting to ignore other pods of whales in his haste, giving in after three months and allowing the men to hunt when there is a scent of mutiny in the air, because the men are only paid on a share of the catch.

Flask's boat is wrecked as they hunt, and the cabin boy Pip is lost. Ahab orders them to set sail but Starbuck refuses. Starbuck stands up to him, resulting in the Captain threatening to kill him. Ahab, backs down when word goes around that Pip has been seen and is rescued. Later, he comes close to killing Ahab as he sleeps, but refrains.

Byron Watson, as Stubb, and Adam Goodburn, as Flask give some fine supporting performances and soprano, Lorena Gore, as the cabin boy, Pip, is lively and manages to sing beautifully even when suspended on a cable when fighting the waves having been swept overboard.
Leonard Foglia's direction keenly finds all of the issues that arise when a large and disparate group of men are confined together for an extended period of time and shows them with a great understanding of humanity. There are issued of sexuality and religion in Melville's writing that are handled well by Foglia who approaches them with a light but fearless touch.

All of the smaller roles have been well cast, with more great work from Andrew Turner, as Daggoo, Douglas McRae, as Tashtego, Gerard Schneider, as a Nantucket Sailor , James Scott, as a Spanish Sailor and a wonderfully concerned father in search of his son is presented by Douglas McNicol, as Captain Gardiner.
Conductor and chorus master, Timothy Sexton, now also the Artistic Director and CEO of State Opera, is in full control of the entire musical side of the production and draws out all of nuances in the rich orchestration, and establishes the marvellous male voice choir work of the State Opera Gentlemen's Chorus. His contribution cannot be underestimated in such a massive undertaking and, if this is a sign of things to come, the company and the future of opera in Adelaide is in very capable hands. Musically, this production has everything from dramatic highlights, to gently lyrical passages and lighter, humorous moments, such as when the men dance together. Sexton discovers the importance all of these moments and the orchestra, the soloists and the chorus are all clearly giving their best under his unerring guidance.

If you have never seen an opera before, because you have incorrectly assumed that they are dull, highbrow, boring and impossible to understand, then go to see this one and discover just how wrong you are. This modern masterpiece is a sensational event from every viewpoint and will appeal to both newcomers and long term lovers of opera. Whatever you do, do not miss this thoroughly rewarding production.

Reviewed by Barry Lenny, Arts Editor, Glam Adelaide.

Link to original review here.

Clemency - Independent on Sunday Review

2011-05-15T20:51:00.002+01:00

James MacMillan's opera weaves the longing for a child with the skewed vision of fundamentalism

Reviewed by Anna Picard

Has James MacMillan mellowed? Clemency, his latest opera, introduces the most complex of subjects in the most direct musical language.

The forces are modest (five singers and 24 strings), the score concise, only 45 minutes long. The hectoring ululations of his St John Passion have softened into an unaccompanied melismatic prayer, prelude to a simple meal. There are allusions to Tippett, Britten, even Palestrina, fluency and brightness in the sunburst arpeggios and golden halos of the orchestration. Most surprisingly, there is a hint of revulsion at the strident certainty of the three Angels who visit Abraham and Sarah on their way to raze Sodom and Gomorrah.

Designed by Alex Eales, with a set in the form of a Flemish altarpiece, Katie Mitchell's Royal Opera House/ Scottish Opera co-production has simplicity and gravity. Having collaborated with MacMillan and his librettist, Michael Symons Roberts, on Parthenogenesis and The Sacrifice, she is attuned to their rhythms. The opera opens to ambient sounds – birdsong and aircraft. In one panel of the triptych, Sarah (Janis Kelly) kneads bread. In the second, Abraham (Grant Doyle) counts his earnings. The third is a mirror image of the second, allowing us to witness the dialogue from both sides.

The branches of an oak tree reach through a broken window into the room where Abraham offers food and shelter to three travellers (Andrew Tortise, Eamonn Mulhall and Adam Green). They enter as workmen and leave as assassins, an otherworldly dazzle of righteous triads in rhythmic unison. For certainty, read fundamentalism. The aircraft noise is the first of several references to 9/11. Having repaid Abraham's mitzvah with the miraculous news of Sarah's pregnancy, the triplets fulminate against the sins of the "twin towns". Abraham's pleas for mercy are ignored, leaving Sarah to contemplate motherhood with "gratitude and terror", as well she might, given this baby's future role as putative sacrifice. One life is given, thousands taken. Is this justice?

Under Clark Rundell's calm, clear beat, the Britten Sinfonia realise MacMillan's score with bite, beauty and vigour. Nothing is lost by the lack of percussion, brass and woodwind. In the dry acoustic of the Linbury Studio, the divisi strings had an astonishing gleam, as did the trio of Old Testament hitmen. How much of Sarah's history with Hagar was in Kelly's characterisation? Was that guilt in her face? Jealousy? Mouth twisted into mirthless laughter or wild nausea, she is riveting, despite a challenging tesseratura and lyrics that ape the King James Bible, without matching its poetry. Doyle's Abraham is sympathetic and eloquent from his opening prayer to his futile imprecations. Best ignore the backstory and what later passes between him and Isaac, miracle child.

Original review link here.

Clemency - The Observer Review

2011-05-15T20:47:00.001+01:00

by Fiona Maddocks

Space is too short to celebrate in full the week's other premieres, each singular in style but abundant in rewards. James MacMillan's chamber opera Clemency, played by the expert and busy Britten Sinfonia strings, conducted by Clark Rundell, was as densely coloured and detailed as the Russian Orthodox icon which in part prompted it. Its starting point is the Old Testament story of Sarah and Abraham before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. One can imagine that MacMillan and his librettist, Michael Symmons Roberts, wrote in a white heat of intensity.

The mood never lets up for the work's 50-minute duration. It ends too soon – scarcely a typical response to new opera. It's the best MacMillan score I have heard, full of muezzin-like chromaticism and, in the string style, a touch of Bartók, but firmly his own. Katie Mitchell's direction, Alex Eales's designs and the cast led by Janis Kelly and Grant Doyle were all excellent.

Original review click here

Clemency - The Stage Review

2011-05-11T15:04:00.005+01:00

by Edward Bhesania

Playing out within the frames of Alex Eales’s giant hinged triptych, James MacMillan’s latest operatic collaboration with poet Michael Symmons Roberts is a contemporary retelling of the Old Testament story of the hospitality of Abraham and Sarah - a childless elderly couple who take in three angels on their way to unleashing God’s judgement upon the sinful nearby towns of Sodom and Gomorrah.

Though operating entirely as a single entity - whether in burnished close-harmony or flourishing Renaissance-style polyphony - the present-day trio (Andrew Tortise, Eamon Mulhall and Adam Green) creates deep-rooted unease through the uncertainty of its objectives. Are these ‘Triplets’ really archangels carrying out God’s work, or fundamentalists bent on destroying their enemies? The trio’s furtive glances and their ritualistic changing from manual workers’ clothes into suits (concealing gun holsters) before leaving for their ‘mission’ suggests one thing - the atrocities they claim to want to halt in the neighbouring towns suggest another.

The trio’s fervent, penetrating intensity is matched by the string players of the Britten Sinfonia - a highly motivated army of generals under the lucid direction of Clark Rundell.

Amid all the searing drama it’s easy to overlook the figures of Abraham and Sarah. Director Katie Mitchell (who also worked on MacMillan’s recent The Sacrifice for Welsh National Opera) succeeds in beautifully and delicately conveying their mutual respect, while Grant Doyle sings Abraham with a pure, uncomplicated richness one could happily listen to all night and Janis Kelly perceptively reflects the burden of Sarah’s longstanding sterility seemingly as much by what is thought as what is sung. Equally powerful in narrative and in musical terms, this work seems to have hit the ground running.

Clemency - Independent Review

2011-05-11T13:42:00.009+01:00

Clemency, Royal Opera House, London

(Rated 5/ 5 )

Reviewed by Jessica Duchen

Less is more: in James MacMillan's music, every note counts. And never more so than in Clemency, the Scottish composer's brand-new chamber opera, which packs questions powerful, emotional, philosophical and religious into just 45 minutes. With his regular librettist Michael Symmons Roberts and the director Katie Mitchell, MacMillan has created a terrifically intense, focused and inspired musical work on a thought-provoking parable, updated to the present day.

Sarah and Abraham, a dowdy middle-aged couple in a run-down apartment, offer hospitality to three men apparently in need of shelter. But the strangers are angels: they bring a divine message that Sarah, despite her age, will soon bear a son. Then, though, they change into suits, concealing guns. Their mission is to take revenge on two towns that have treated outsiders with cruelty. Abraham argues for clemency. The ethics of "collective punishment" are never far away.

Mitchell's staging and the excellent designs by Alex Eales present this fable in a tripartite frame that suggests an altarpiece, while remaining naturalistic behind it. First, for several music-less minutes, Sarah cooks, birds sing, planes pass overhead. Abraham, alone at prayer, sings long phrases with quasi-Middle Eastern ornamentation. But the characterisation is unfailing: Sarah, sung by the marvellous Janis Kelly, has soaring, palpitating and plunging lines as her emotions are buffeted by fear and elation. Abraham, the full-toned Grant Doyle, is straightforward, humble but tenacious. The "triplets" are heard first in close harmony, almost as if with one voice at three pitches: an otherworldly sound, performed with frightening power by Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall and Andrew Tortise.

But there's another character: the orchestra – the strings of the Britten Sinfonia, conducted by Clark Rundell. They play as if possessed in instrumental episodes that seem to argue the points, amplify the emotions and ratchet up the tension. These passages structure the score just as the three-part picture-frame structures the staging.

The end, though, seemed rather abrupt. In the ensuing long silence, we waited and hoped for a few extra concluding minutes.

Original review link here

Clemency - Telegraph Review

2011-05-10T17:19:00.008+01:00

James MacMillan's new one-act libretto is subtly haunting and quietly powerful

Rating: * * * *

By Rupert Christiansen

Drawn loosely from a story in Genesis and perhaps also inspired by Britten’s church parables, Clemency is a new one-act opera by the Catholic composer James MacMillan, working for the third time with the librettist Michael Symmons Roberts and director Katie Mitchell. Subtly haunting and quietly powerful, it is a parable of God’s will in the world, its precise significance left opaque.

Abraham and Sarah are presented as a middle-aged childless couple living in honest poverty – as so often in Mitchell’s work, the resonance suggest the Balkans during the wars of the 1990s. Three unknown young men, dressed in military fatigues, appear at their door. Abraham and Sarah show them hospitality, for which they are grateful.

They tell Sarah that, although she is past the age of child-bearing, she will bear a son. Abraham and Sarah are sceptical of the men’s right to speak for God, but the men explain that they have come to wreak divine vengeance on the “twin towns” nearby. Angels or terrorists (or both), they change into dark suits, produce weaponry and prepare to fulfil their mission.

Abraham cannot believe the stories they tell of the wickedness which pervades the towns. He begs for clemency. Find “50 acts of selflessness” among the inhabitants, he says, and relent. The men agree, and Abraham continues to bargain – find 40, 30, 10 and spare them, he implores.

But they will not meet Abraham’s final plea that one good deed will bring salvation. Sarah is left contemplating the birth of a longed-for son, but wonders what sort of world he will inherit. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord. The pace is slow but sure, the idiom harmonically intense, the mood bleak, solemn and impassioned, often evoking threnodic Orthodox chant.

Otherwise, there are no fancy effects or percussive extravagances, the sense of spiritual austerity being underpinned by an orchestra of strings alone. The Britten Sinfonia plays with total assurance under Clark Rundell. Mitchell and her designer Alex Eales set the drama on a stage divided into a gold-framed triptych of three rooms.

Grant Doyle and Janis Kelly as Abraham and Sarah and Eamonn Mulhall, Andrew Tortise and baritone Adam Green as the mysterious visitors make up an ideal cast.

This is an opera which leaves a lasting effect, and I want to hear it again soon.

Original review link here

Clemency - New Statesman Review

2011-05-10T13:23:00.007+01:00

Fleeting visions

by Alexandra Coghlan

James MacMillan's latest chamber opera is difficult to pin down.

Our English word "guest" derives from the Greek "xenos". It's a word whose historical and etymological tensions are hidden in its interchangeable meanings of guest, host and stranger. It is the friction inherent to this idea of hospitality, of the unstable relationship of power, otherness and duty between host and guest, that animates James MacMillan's latest chamber opera Clemency.

Following where 2000's Parthenogenesis led, Clemency is strongly informed by the composer's Roman Catholic faith, an affiliation shared with Michael Symmons Roberts, librettist for both works. Taking that most inscrutable of Genesis stories, The Hospitality of Abraham (most familiar from Andrei Rublev's fifteenth-century icon of the same name), as its root, MacMillan cultivates the tale into a contemporary social fable. Complicating the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah through their pointed rechristening as the "twin towns", Macmillan's oblique parable stretches beyond morality into the realm of contemporary politics.

Scored for five singers and string orchestra, Clemency's brisk 50 minutes chart the intrusion of three strangers into the quiet domesticity of the aged Abraham and Sarah. Welcomed and fed, the strangers foretell that when they return in a year Sarah will have had a son, and the couple recognise them as angels. Learning of their plans to destroy neighbouring towns, Abraham pleads with them for mercy, eventually extracting a promise that if just five good men are found the towns will be spared.

Framing the action within a gilt-edged triptych, Alex Eales' set anchors the opera in the symbolic, two-dimensional world of religious iconography. This flattened perspective (mirrored physically in some clever spatial use of the three panelled stage sections) chafes fruitfully against the detailed naturalism of the sets and Katie Mitchell's direction, giving weight to their grubby contemporary banality.

While MacMillan is perhaps best-known for his Celtic-inflected choral works, his operatic writing has proved itself altogether tougher and more flexible. After the lyric abrasions of Parthenogenesis it was hard to be satisfied with Clemency's uneasy mix of pastiche Eastern Orthodoxy (with MacMillan's signature Lombardic ornaments reinvented as Klezmer-style embellishments) and sub-Vaughan Williams string effects.

The same mewling violin cries that pleaded so eloquently in the opening of The Confession of Isobel Gowdie here lost any emotional referent, and while much of the string writing had a muscular brilliance about it, its coherence was lost in the Babel of harmonic languages. Quite literally out of tune with their earthly surroundings, the music of the Triplets (strongly sung by Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall, Andrew Tortise) established its own modal sound-world, the three-voices-in-one presenting a striking musical Trinity. Only the occasional unisons were marred by the challenge of blending three such different vocal tones.

Grant Doyle led the cast as Abraham in a beautifully-judged piece of singing that brought authority without bombast to some of MacMillan's loveliest writing. The delicacy of his performance was matched by Janis Kelly's life-worn Sarah, whose quiet presence only fully surrendered to song in the rather ambiguous ending.
Having the strings of the Britten Sinfonia (efficiently conducted by Clark Rundell) as orchestra was a piece of luxury casting by no means fully exploited by the deeply sunken pit. Given the Linbury's almost endlessly flexible setup, perhaps a more prominent position could usefully have been found for them, mirroring the instrumental prominence MacMillan's music demands and achieving more direct interplay with the singers.
While MacMillan's orchestral and choral works establish a sound-world on their own terms, giving the composer one of the most recognisable voices of contemporary British music, this has not always been true of his operas. Caught up in the moment-to-moment reflection of the libretto's images, he can forget to ground the music in a self-sufficient framework or language, leaving it curiously vulnerable and elusive. With Symmons Roberts' inscrutable text our sole concordance here, MacMillan's biblical vision failed to make itself understood, barring us from interpretation even as the spread wings of the triptych invited us in.

Original review link here

Clemency - FT Review

2011-05-09T17:52:00.010+01:00

Clemency, Linbury Studio Theatre, London

By Andrew Clark


Grant Doyle as Abraham

James MacMillan completed his new chamber opera long before the US sent a group of commandos to neutralise Osama bin Laden – and yet his adaptation of an Old Testament tale could hardly have been better calculated to raise questions about the raid’s moral validity.
Three mysterious men arrive at the home of Abraham and Sarah, who offer them hospitality. The men are either angels on a mission to administer God’s justice to a nearby community or terrorists bent on violence. Abraham asks them to show clemency towards the “good”.

The piece is loaded with all sorts of knotty questions. Who is good and who is bad, and who are we to judge? Is revenge sufficient reason for summary justice? Can violence ever be justified, even when ordered by an Old Testament God?

Clemency was premiered by ROH2, the Royal Opera House’s fig leaf for small-scale creativity. The piece really belongs in church, for Michael Symmons Roberts’ libretto is too bluntly moralistic to be taken seriously in an opera house. MacMillan’s score, ranging across quasi-Orthodox chant, lyrical reflection and passages of extreme tension, never lets us see Abraham and Sarah as anything other than symbols.

But at 50 minutes Clemency does not overstay its welcome. The instrumental accompaniment could best be described as a concerto for string orchestra, with techniques lifted from Vaughan Williams and Tippett. It is equally indebted to Hungarian folk music. All this enhances MacMillan’s reputation as a skilled musical magpie.

Katie Mitchell’s staging, conducted by Clark Rundell, is sensitive to the work’s ambiguities. Its biggest asset is Alex Eales’s three-room set, built like a gilt-framed altar. Janis Kelly and Grant Doyle give meaning to their every movement, while the so-called “Triplets” – Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall and Andrew Tortise – blend together well.

Original Review link here.

Clemency – Guardian Review

2011-05-08T18:00:00.016+01:00

by Tim Ashley
Sunday 8 May 2011 18.00 BST

Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall and Andrew Tortise
Photograph: Tristram Kenton

Clemency, James MacMillan's new opera for five singers and string orchestra, is about "vengeance and mercy", according to its librettist, Michael Symmons Roberts. A co-production between ROH2 and Scottish Opera, it's a religious work that examines the inscrutable nature of divine justice by recasting part of the book of Genesis in contemporary terms.

Abraham offers hospitality to three mysterious, angelic Triplets, who prophesy that his wife Sarah, who is ageing and childless, will have a son within a year. The Triplets are also bent, however, on the vengeful destruction of the "twin towns" that stand nearby. Abraham is soon pleading with them, in vain, to spare the towns if they can be found to contain five people who are "good in heart and mind".

There are problems with some of this. The words "twin towns", with their overtones of twin towers, raise provocative implications of terrorism, though the programme notes tell us that some sort of vigilante action is what is intended. The towns, meanwhile, are a latter-day Sodom and Gomorrah: distancing themselves from a narrative responsible for centuries of homophobia, MacMillan and Symmons Roberts reimagine them as the centre of a dictatorship predicated on torture and injustice.

The text is opaque, at times esoteric. Symmons Roberts indulges in overload: "My destiny is played out on its wall of pearl" is a typical line. Parts of it are in what I took to be Hebrew and/or Aramaic, but we're offered no guidance as to their meaning. The score, however, has some attractive moments, though there's a bit too much consciously ecstatic string writing in the tradition of Tippett's Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli. Sarah has a striking central aria. The Triplets sing in close harmony that broadens into suave polyphony with overtones of Palestrina.

It's well done. There's shapely playing from the Britten Sinfonia under Clark Rundell. Janis Kelly registers Sarah's "gratitude and terror" towards God in a performance of considerable power. Grant Doyle is her bewildered, angry Abraham, while Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall and Andrew Tortise are curiously seductive as the Triplets.

Katie Mitchell's modern-dress production contains the action in a framed three-part set that resembles a triptych, and ingeniously offers multiple perspectives on the same series of rooms. There are some clever touches, with the Triplets arriving dressed as workmen, but departing for Sodom in suits, Reservoir Dogs-style. Mitchell wisely plays most of it straight, though: some of it is simply too dense to warrant interpretative interference.

Original review link here.

Clemency - What's On Stage Review

2011-05-08T13:56:00.004+01:00

by Mark Valencia

The gates of a great triptych stand open, but no painted icons lie within. Instead, each panel contains a fragment of a house: one shows part of a kitchen, the others a bare living room seen from two different perspectives. It is modern but dilapidated. The branch of a tree has shattered the window and grown indoors, a reminder of the permanence of nature in a transient human world. For James McMillan’s new operatic treatment of an Old Testament tale, these designs by Alex Eales provide a striking collision of ancient and modern - an early promise that is not fulfilled by the opera itself despite the presence of five excellent soloists and the commanding advocacy of Clark Rundell and the Britten Sinfonia strings.

Chapter 18 of the Book of Genesis relates a slender fable in which Abraham and his wife, Sarah, are visted by three angels to whom they offer hospitality, and who in turn foretell that within a year Sarah will have a child. The angels prepare to leave, letting slip that they are on their way to trash the nearby towns of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham persuades the celestial trio to spare them if they can find ten good people living there.

I do hope it’s by accident, not design, that the libretto by Michael Symmons Roberts refers to Sodom and Gomorrah not by name but as ‘the twin towns’, and that careless diction alone causes the word ‘towns’ to sound so much like ‘towers’; but since the opera recasts the story in an amorphous modern setting (we could be anywhere from Latvia to Libya) I fear the glib worst. If Clemency has a moral message it is a confusing one: the three angels are depicted as migrant black-economy workers who morph into gun-hungry gangsters out for mayhem, yet good old Abraham softens their hearts with the most childlike of reasoning.

McMillan has scored his opera for strings alone, and it is a disappointment. One does not anticipate pastiche from a composer who, twenty years ago, showed such originality in works like The Confession of Isobel Gowdie and the stunning Seven Last Words from the Cross, yet for stretches here the string writing is an uneasy mishmash of Klezmer, Vaughan Williams and rehashed McMillan. True, some of the innovative string effects are ear-popping, as is often the way with this technically prodigious composer, but on first hearing at least the musical value of Clemency appears uncharacteristically slight.

Grant Doyle’s Abraham has vocal clarity and physical composure, and Janis Kelly brings a careworn dignity to the under-written role of his wife, Sarah. The three angels (‘Triplets’) are very well played by Adam Green, Eamonn Mulhall and Andrew Tortise as a closely harmonised trio whose music recalls Britten’s Canticle IV, The Journey of the Magi.

As a theatre director, Katie Mitchell is unsurpassed in the psychological acuity of her characterisation; but although she brings her customary skill to staging this 45-minute piece, she never quite probes to its heart. Perhaps it doesn’t have one.

Original review link here.

Clemency - Classical Source Review

2011-05-07T13:46:00.003+01:00

ROH2 – Clemency

Peter Reed | Saturday, May 07, 2011

With the same sort of Christian provenance that generated “Parthenogenesis” (centred round an unnatural/miraculous birth), James MacMillan and his librettist Michael Symmons Roberts have turned to another miraculous delivery in their chamber opera “Clemency”. The story comes from the book of Genesis (chapter 18) in which three angels (referred to as Triplets in the cast list) tell the elderly (post-menopausal) Sarah, wife of the patriarch Abraham, that she will give birth to a son (Isaac) – the key event in the establishment of the tribes of Israel. It’s a long-distance Annunciation, which can be interpreted as an anticipation of the birth of Christ. The legend – a remarkable piece of writing – doesn’t stop there, though.

The three angels have also been sent to sort out the “twin towns” of sin, Sodom and Gomorrah, and there is a strange, shaggy-dog-style passage in which Abraham tries to strike a bargain to spare those good, blameless townsfolk, however few of them there are – an early precedent of human intercession with a vengeful Almighty. In a contemporary twist, the three angels are messengers of retribution who refer to the “twin towns” of depravation in a similar way as terrorists referred to the “twin towers” of a corrupt city, to be punished with annihilation. Miraculous birth, pleas for mercy and terrorist angels hell-bent on jihad – a tall order for an opera that lasts about 50 minutes, the first five of which were played in total silence, supposedly establishing the quiet ease of Abraham and Sarah’s marriage but rather raising anxieties about a possible technical fault.

Katie Mitchell’s production is contemporary miserabilist – gritty, you might call it; Alex Eales’s set was like a hinged altar triptych, so that whatever was going on in each frame was presented as a picture, and dignified with a timeless quality. On the evidence of “Parthenogenesis”, MacMillan and Roberts are very good at folding in any numbers of layers into their work and letting them find their own resonance. In “Clemency”, though, much of the libretto was lost in the singing – Abraham had a long opening solo, supposedly in made-up Aramaic, and apparently there were other passages in cod-Latin , but much of it could have been in double-Dutch for all you could make out the words. MacMillan has scored it for string orchestra, and that sound comes packed with particularly English, pastoral associations. Apart from some obviously Arabian Nights-style emblematic inflections, the music had the powerful flavour of Vaughan Williams or Tippett in assertively mystic/ecstatic mode. MacMillan is a fine writer for voices and a vivid reactor to words and images, but I have still to discern an unmistakable style.

Grant Doyle was a powerful vocal and stage presence, and breezed through the demands the music made of him. Janis Kelly was a formidable Sarah (as indeed Sarah is in the Bible - she was quite a matriarchal handful) and delivered a sympathetic and dramatic performance. The two-tenors, one-baritone trio of angels were vividly realised and chillingly evoked the power of blind faith. Clark Rundell conducted with a feel for the score’s immediacy, and there are some fine players in the Britten Sinfonia.

Original review link here

Hugh the Drover @ Cadogan Hall

2010-11-19T15:01:00.002Z

by Lottie Greenhow

“I want to set a prizefight to music” was the statement that led to the composition of Vaughan Williams’ much-overlooked opera, Hugh the Drover. It is strange, then, that something so aggressive could lead to an opera so charming. The plot is a simple love story, set in a Cotswolds village during the Napoleonic wars, and the music is accordingly uncomplicated – simple interwoven English folk-song melodies set above complex but interesting tonalities.

New Sussex Opera is currently touring an engaging and intimate production of this underperformed masterpiece, taking it to a variety of institutions from theatres to concert halls. To accommodate this wide range of venues, designer Yann Seabra’s set is relatively simple, with all the scene changes manipulated smoothly by chorus members, and this matches Vaughan Williams’ folk-song style, and is also beautifully complemented by Giulia Scrimieri’s charming costume designs.

Director Michael Moxham overcame the daunting task of creating a production that works well in these different settings, and his interpretation maintained its visual and dramatic interest throughout the performance. Highlights included a superbly choreographed fight scene between Hugh the Drover and John the Butcher, and an excitingly tense portrayal of Mary’s efforts to free Hugh from the stocks.
Soprano Celeste Lazarenko as Mary, the country girl who longs for freedom and adventure, was a complete delight. Her silvery, light soprano, combined with a gentle confidence on stage, matched her character’s demeanour perfectly. Mary’s desire for liberation was particularly eloquent during the second act, where her lines are set against exquisite violin solos, so reminiscent of The Lark Ascending (composed around the same time), underpinned by dark harmonies that serve to heighten the sense of unattainable freedom.
In the title role, Daniel Norman gave an entirely convincing and unforced performance as the handsome yet unassuming Hugh. He produced a confident and focused sound throughout his range, with some passionate top notes, and his sensitive and heartfelt arias were exceptionally moving. The chemistry between Norman and Lazarenko was electric; their voices blended exquisitely during their duet, ‘Lord of my life’ and they both produced beautifully tender phrasing during their love scenes.

Another very strong performance came from Clarissa Meek as Aunt Jane, whose rich warm mezzo-soprano and calm confidence on stage both lent themselves admirably to her extremely touching aria in the first act, where she explains the joys of domesticity to Mary. Simon Thorpe made a confident and imposing John the Butcher, his deep baritone colouring his character’s aggressive nature. Some of the comic highlights of the evening came in the form of a fantastic double-act between William Robert Allenby as the Constable and Gareth John as the Turnkey, with John’s ringing tenor providing a fitting contrast to Allenby’s solid baritone.

Strongest amongst the principals was baritone Grant Doyle, who performed both the Showman in the first act and the Sergeant in the second act. His resonant baritone (the only voice that could always be heard above the orchestra) worked well in both roles, with some sizzling top notes lending excitement to the role. This, coupled with excellent diction, made him truly captivating throughout the performance. Whilst he made a solid and confident Sergeant, it was in the first act as the Showman that he really excelled himself. Dressed as Napoleon Bonaparte, complete with an oversized hat and flamboyant purple cravat, he performed the Showman’s francophobic aria with terrific burlesque energy and panache, commanding the stage and projecting genuine enjoyment.

For a company that considers its amateurs to be at its heart, it was a shame that New Sussex Opera made so little of its ‘expert and unpaid’ 32-strong chorus. Hidden behind the orchestra, the chorus performed with great energy, but too little attention was paid to blend, tuning and diction and a lot of their dramatic efforts were lost behind the band simply because it was too difficult to see them. Chorus members also took some of the smaller leads; unfortunately, they sounded all too amateur next to the professional principals, although they performed with confidence and verve.

The small NSO orchestra was present on stage behind the action, and although the balance was good within the ensemble, it repeatedly overpowered the chorus and occasionally the principals as well. However, under Nicholas Jenkins’ energetic direction, the band played with feeling and vivacity, with a particularly impressive performance from percussionist Oliver Lowe, whose dramatic snare-drum crescendo to announce the entrance of the soldiers added a tense anticipation to the action on stage.

This was a very moving and musically intelligent production of a vastly underappreciated opera, which just goes to show what can be achieved on a shoestring budget by a pro-am opera company. Whilst it has its shortcomings, overall this was a touching, heart-warming and intensely enjoyable performance, full of feeling. Highly recommended.

Hugh the Drover - New Sussex Opera

2010-11-19T12:03:00.005Z

by David Gutman

Inspired by his desire to set a prize fight to music, Hugh the Drover was Vaughan Williams’s first opera and he thought enough of the piece to keep toying with it for decades. Thanks to a Harold Child libretto replete with folksy, Cotswold village archetypes, it is rarely staged by the big companies and the present revival, which plays up the neighbourhood element by deploying a children’s chorus drawn from local schools, is well worth catching. The score, always strongly melodic and hinting at more familiar Vaughan Williams, includes some radiant music for Hugh, a benign (and here bewigged) proto-Peter Grimes, sung by the experienced tenor Daniel Norman, and Mary, his rebellious love interest, a fine portrayal from the young Australian soprano Celeste Lazarenko. The professional, mainly Anglo-Australian cast also boasts rising baritone Grant Doyle as both the Johnny Depp-style showman and a stentorian sergeant.

Yann Seabra’s accessible design favours simple wooden forms, while signalling the lure of a freer natural world beyond rigid communal boundaries. The key props are a gibbet and the village stocks. The central fight is choreographed with conviction and only the show’s downbeat ending runs counter to the text. On opening night with Simon Thorpe unwell, the role of John the Butcher was bravely sung in from the side of the stage by Adrian Powter - the chorus sounded nervous. There are four more performances with which to celebrate New Sussex Opera’s commitment to indigenous music theatre without public subsidy. The orchestral texture is sensitively handled by a 33-piece ensemble under Nicholas Jenkins.

Pearl Fishers - GlamAdelaide Review

2010-09-14T20:10:00.001+01:00

This production, originally directed by Anne-Margret Pettersson for Opera Australia and with this revival directed by Luise Napier, takes the bold move of casting four suitably young performers in the solo roles and has a young South Australian conductor, Luke Dollman, making his debut with State Opera. This has resulted in a youthful exuberance and energy that makes this production more than usually believable and certainly makes it fresh and exciting.

From the first, beautifully controlled and emotionally charged notes of the overture there is a feeling of expectation that is quickly fulfilled. Dollman’s interpretation of Georges Bizet’s texturally rich and imaginative score, superbly realised by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, is a highlight of this excellent production. The work of the State Opera Chorus cannot be faulted and the dance routines, choreographed by Rosetta Cook, add to the exotic flavour of this opera, which is set in 1860s Ceylon. Added to this is the visual side of the production, with the most beautiful sets by John Conklin, costumes by Clare Mitchell and a marvellous lighting design by Nigel Levings.

Zurga, a bitter and lonely old man, has returned from the opera, reminded by what he has just seen of the past and of his love for his friend Nadir. His memories become the opera that we are about to see. The core of the story is the love triangle of the two friends, Zurga and Nadir, and the girl that came between them, Léïla. Nadir promised Zurga that he would never see Léïla again in order to save their friendship. The two meet again some time later and Zurga is elected leader of the pearl fishers.

Nourabad, the High Priest of Brahma, engages a virgin priestess to pray day and night for the pearl divers in their dangerous occupation. He warns her of the dire consequences of any failure on her part to remain chaste and obedient, and she accepts the responsibility. Although she is veiled Nadir recognises her voice as that of Léïla. He sneaks in to meet her that night and they declare their love for one another before being captured and sentenced to death.

Zurga at first tries to save his friend but, realising that the woman is Léïla he is both jealous and furious at Nadir’s betrayal, condemning them both to death. He then realises that Léïla, when she was a small child, was the one who had saved his life. He sets the camp alight, drawing off the villagers, and allows Nadir and Léïla to escape.

Soprano, Leanne Kenneally, and tenor, James Egglestone, make a fine pair of lovers as Léïla and Nadir. Their voices blend superbly and the emotional content of their performances is highly convincing. Baritone, Grant Doyle, as Zurga, offers an equally wide range of emotions in a third strong performance. The balance between the three excellent performances adds up to a very even production that works at every level. Bass, Pelham Andrews, is marvellously powerful and imposing in the role of Nourabad, perhaps not as large a role as the other three but just as important. This is a terrific line-up of soloists, one of the best we have seen from State Opera, and that is saying something!

This is a thoroughly absorbing and rewarding production that, if not already sold out, certainly deserves to be. If you can still get a ticket, do so as quickly as possible.

Reviewed by Barry Lenny, Arts Editor, Glam Adelaide.

Pearl Fishers - The Advertiser Review

2010-09-14T13:06:00.002+01:00

LOVE is a very strange thing. It can strike like lightning. It can wound like a knife. It will mark you forever and, like a precious pearl, it is only gained though great risk. Dive for it; die for it. That is the challenge of this exquisitely beautiful production which will break your heart. The Pearl Fishers is handsomely cast, and sung in French so clearly you don't need the surtitles.

There is so much more to The Pearl Fishers than Australia's favourite duet, here given a beautiful rendering by James Egglestone and Grant Doyle, and once that's out of the way the true strength of the work becomes clear.

Ann-Margret Pettersson's original conception, lovingly restaged by Luise Napier, makes the opera a series of sad reminiscences inspired by an opera production, whose images appear throughout the evening. The idea reinforces the power of music and drama to touch our hearts. Made explicit in the action, though always there in the music, is the tragedy of Zurga who loses the man he loves to another woman and Grant Doyle's great monologue is delivered with compelling passion. Always a fine actor, he reaches a new stage of his career in this role.

The relative youth of the principal cast, two fine featured men and a strikingly attractive woman add to the dramatic impact of this tragedy of lost love. Their voices are young and bright and the attractions that they feel for each other are entirely convincing. If only at their first meeting, after so long a separation, Zurga had actually kissed Nadir instead of just giving him a big manhug. Leanne Kenneally, the priestess Leila, first appears veiled and posed like a statue framed in gold but descends to Earth as a woman in love, with a clear and expressive voice.

Egglestone's bright young tenor voice has a distinctive ring so suitable for French music and his delivery of the first act serenade is almost perfect. Pelham Andrews as Nourabad, almost entirely concealed behind extravagant facial hair, has developed greater depth and warmth in his voice since Girl of the Golden West, and completes the strong principal quartet with honour.

Timothy Sexton's chorus, both off stage and on, add their own part with conviction. Luke Dolman reins in the melodrama inherent in the score to focus attention on the underlying romance of Bizet's music; and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra is as ever responsive.

The design team of John Conklin and Catherine Mitchell, sets and costumes, create an exotic series of visions, infused with magic through Nigel Levings' lighting score, and create a world of Sri Lankan beauty that entirely reflects the genius of Bizet.

Take a hanky. You'll probably need it. I did.

Ewart Shaw

Fantastic Mr Fox (Guardian)

2010-08-08T12:35:00.001+01:00

By Fiona Maddocks

Grant Doyle as Fantastic Mr Fox

Seven of its players (City of London Sinfonia) had been hard at work earlier in the day, performing in the European premiere run of Tobias Picker's Fantastic Mr Fox (1998) a family opera based on Roald Dahl's story. Holland Park had commissioned a shorter version, performed in the magical wooded glade of the yukka lawn. A spirited young cast led by Grant Doyle and Olivia Ray as Mr and Mrs Fox held its young audience captive. Four Botticellian wood sprites, who could also sing divinely, led the promenade performance from tree to tree. It was expertly done and deserves a life beyond west London. OHP has high hopes that, with festivals such as Latitude showing interest, it will.

The Elixir of Love (What's on Stage Review)

2010-07-17T11:41:00.001+01:00

The Elixir of Love
Date Reviewed: 16 July 2010
WOS Rating:

Blackheath Community Opera at Blackheath Halls

Following Gluck’s Orpheus last Summer, Blackheath Halls took on the perils of bel canto this year, with a production of Donizetti’s ingenious comedy The Elixir of Love, once again combining professional and amateur performers.

It proved a perfect vehicle for the chorus and orchestra drawn from the locality and a top-notch quintet of solo vocalists.

Elena Xanthoudakis was the flighty Adina, confidently spinning out the coloratura like a bird in flight, Nicholas Sharratt an ardent Nemorino, the simple village lad in love with her, while Grant Doyle blustered and swaggered as the over-weening Belcore.
Helen Bailey, currently doing post-grad studies at the Royal Academy, was a chirpily attractive Giannetta and Robert Poulton, displaying a wealth of experience and showmanship, was the spiv Dulcamara, dispensing his dodgy mixtures on the unaware and snaffling wedding presents when no-one was looking.

But what makes Blackheath Halls Community Opera so special is the involvement of a mass of local talent of all ages, here superbly deployed as villagers and orchestra.

Recent productions of the opera at Covent Garden and English National Opera updated the action of Donizetti’s 1832 opera to 1950s Italy and America respectively, while here director Harry Fehr and designer Emma Wee put it right in our own back yard. Setting it a decade earlier, we were in an entirely apt England in the grips of war-time austerity.

Performed in the round, or on three sides at least with the orchestra making up the fourth, the production brought everything up close (sitting in the front row, you could almost end up with a land girl or farmhand in your lap), with banks of tables and benches constantly on the move and a really evocative sense of the period.

A member of the chorus told me that Fehr knew each of their names and this impressive, personal approach led to a riveting engagement from each and every participant, with a wealth of detail in the crowd scenes. Home guard oldsters mixed with nubile young beauties, eager for the attentions of the US military, while ladies (a little) older sat in a knitting circle making their contribution to the war effort.

Costume Supervisors Libby Blogg and Nicola Namdjou came up with a dazzling array of costume changes. My grandma might have tutted at the range of cakes and tarts in the wedding scene, somehow conjured up in the war-time absence of basic cooking materials, but the children were less concerned with historical accuracy as they eagerly fell upon them at the end of the curtain call.

Nicholas Jenkins conducted a confident and able band of amateur players, with a gorgeous solo bassoon during Nemorino’s third act aria (“Una furtive lagrima”) deserving special mention.

But it’s the infectious enthusiasm of the whole that hit the strongest. The cast looked as though they were having a ball and the audience were too. It was another triumph for Blackheath’s annual community event - roll on next year.

- by Simon Thomas

Farewell to Figaro at Garsington

2010-07-16T11:18:00.001+01:00

By Mike Reynolds (****)

For its final season in the garden of Lady Ottoline Morrell's enchanting Oxfordshire Manor house, the ever-enterprising Garsington Opera, established in 1989 by the late Leonard Ingrams, included the opera with which the whole venture kicked off: Figaro. In 1989 it was Opera 80 (a forerunner of ETO) that provided the production, directed by Stephen Unwin – in the years since then there have been productions by Michael McCaffery, Stephen Unwin (again) and, in 2005 a vintage production by John Cox. It was the latter which was revived for the 2010 season and a very astute choice it proved to be. A Figaro of this quality, sung and played with delightful naturalness as dusk stole over the façade of the house and its adjacent garden, made one quite nostalgic for all that has been – indeed, there were more ghosts than usual mingling with the urns and cypresses in Act Four…

To begin at the beginning: the concept. Cox is a past master of making the intricate look easy, making the inhabitants of Count Almaviva's mansion move freely and logically into their positions where something is always just about to happen. Of course in the Garsington setting it is relatively easy to make Cherubino's escape into the garden an unusually effective piece of theatre, and a drunken old Antonio can potter to his heart's delight among the geraniums and connecting pathways: but it is a greater test of the director's art to plot the onstage pathways and connecting lines between the characters. With all the elements of a mansion house scattered across the Garsington stage, Cox used every hiding place, every logical entry and exit point, every positional combination of his eight main characters. As a result this Figaro had light and space to breathe, it flowed freely, the momentum of une folle journée was never lost. Watching an opera I have probably seen more times than any other, I was enchanted by the life and energy that can be made to flow from it.

In the pit, Douglas Boyd proved to be a natural Mozartian. His tempi were broadly on the fast side, but with no loss of detail, and the playing he got from the Garsington Orchestra was accomplished throughout. Boyd also proved to have a natural rapport with his singers, and there were no signs of awkwardness between pit and stage, as there often can be: ensembles went with a swing, solo numbers and duets were nicely judged, sforzandi and dynamic contrasts abounded – delightful.

Delightful too was the Susanna of Sophie Bevan – warm-toned, assured, full of spirit and effortlessly in control of her Figaro (James Oldfield) from the word go. She schemed as he counted and measured, she also bloomed vocally a while before he got going. Bevan's voice is attractive, much more than a soubrette, with plenty of power whenever needed. I liked her performance enormously. Oldfield was a reliable, dependable Figaro and once or twice he flashed into real life – particularly when brushing with Count Almaviva.

Grant Doyle was the Count. He had the greater stage experience, and it showed: this Count was lithe, energetic, a dangerous man to cross. But thankfully – as he is indeed crossed, time after time as the opera progresses – Doyle found the happy medium between grand seigneur and comic dupe. His voice is on the light side, but the timbre is attractive and Doyle sang cleanly and crisply throughout.

Garsington made an interesting choice of Countess – Kishani Jayasinghe, a Sri Lankan soprano who was in the ROH Jette Parker Young Artists Programme until 2008. Younger then many a Countess I have seen, Jayasinghe made an immediate impression with a dark, velvety vocal timbre in the cruelly exposed number that begins Act Two, Porgi, Amor. But she did not really develop any personality onstage, vocal or representational, and although her interplay with Susanna and with Cherubino was deft and assured in the succession of great numbers that make the end of Act Two one of opera's supreme experiences, Jayasinghe under-characterised her part. The voice is often lovely but the face and body lack dramatic energy and, as a result, action around the Countess sometimes flagged. I would rate her a near miss in the part for now – and would enjoy hearing her again in five years time.

Cherubino was played by the young Swedish mezzo Anna Grevelius. Deft and knowing, she made the most of the mischievous aspects of Cherubino's character and gave us some lovely singing. 'Non so piu' was taken at medium tempo, allowing Grevelius to phrase the lines and float the endings, instead of snatching at the notes as so often can happen. She made a strong impression in all the right ways.

And the strength in depth of this Garsington Figaro extended to Jean Rigby as Marcellina – what a joy to hear this role so well sung (and for once it would have been great to hear her Act Four aria) – and to Conal Coad as Dr Bartolo, who relished his showpiece aria 'La Vendetta', and who underpinned all his ensemble pieces with a sonorous bass line. And taking the production as a whole, it was the ensemble playing at its core that made the work come alive, one last time, in its unique setting. What a way for Figaro to take its leave of Garsington! What a joy to have been there!

Photos: Johan Persson

Le nozze di Figaro, Garsington Opera (the Arts Desk)

2010-06-13T12:09:00.003+01:00

Written by Igor Toronyi-Lalic

John Cox's production: 'Its dogged wigs-'n'-breeches line did what many more daring productions fail to do, namely, elucidate the story'

The sun rode high, the gardens glowed green, my lemon berry pudding bulged proudly and, on stage, the familiar 24-carat farce that is Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro was working itself out to perfection. It was Garsington - and my baking - at its very finest, a fittingly triumphant opening to the final season at Garsington Manor (they move down the road to Wormsley Estate next year). Sets, direction, singing - two young standouts in particular - all had a part to play, as did the conducting of Douglas Boyd. The country house conductor (an unsung role) has the singular task of somehow warding off the inevitable, scientifically inescapable consequences of a beating sun and a vat of wine on an ageing audience - namely, the catnap. Boyd proved himself the catnap-vanquisher par excellence.

Musical excitement came not just in the exercise of dynamic muscle and speed - underpinned by strong beats and secure corners. It came also with the squeezing of every drop of dramatic colour and narrative interest from this extraordinary score. Boyd's attention to detail, inner voicing, tremolo colour and musical phrasing - that was at times so buxom in its peaks as to compete for attention with our curvaceous young Susanna, Sophie Bevan - meant the musical evening never flagged. All of which attention to instrumental finery had its impact on the orchestra, who played out of their skins.

On stage, there was far less re-inventive flash. John Cox's production could just as well have been a revival from 1805 as 2005, such was its dogged wigs-'n'-breeches line of thought. Not that any of this mattered to any of us in the audience; it did what many more daring productions fail to do, namely, elucidate the story. Le nozze is a Feydeau-like play, where assignations and accidents set off jack-in-the-box denouements in each act. The mechanics need to be oiled properly, set off efficiently and allowed to run their course unimpeded, with only the slightest and subtlest of guidance, and Cox knows it. With the help of Robert Perdziola's clever, efficient sets - whose angles and corridors and Lego-like action drew applause every time they changed their configuration - and the real gardens coming into play in the Act Two "who-fell-into-the-garden" japery, everything - comedy, tension, denouement- unfolded like clockwork.

The real rise in temperature, however, the two teaspoons of baking powder in this golden operatic sponge, let's say, came from two young singers: Bevan and Anna Grevelius (Cherubino). Grevelius made the first big impression by leaping head-first into her breathless opening aria. Her tone was sweet, windy, air-borne, full of a deliberate nervous energy; it's what one imagines a young Mary Garden might have sounded like in her day. Bevan was even more extraordinary as Susanna, filling this character's many roles (accomplice, wronged lover, mothering-figure, flirt) with exceptional ease. Her solo stints were as stunning as her ornamented contributions to ensemble.

Next to these two fresh daisies, Kishani Jayasinghe's thick, creamy voice, which always hung back from the beat for extra emotional attention, was less interesting. Her musical instinct and dynamic urge never quite made as much sense as the others. James Oldfield's cerebral, brooding Figaro was finely - perhaps too finely - drawn. Grant Doyle's hairy-chested Count was nicely poised between the greaseball and the cad. Conal Coad's Doctor Bartolo delivered some lovely low sounds, full and clean, through passages of pianissimo and forte. Daniel Norman (Don Basilio) was more engaging when in full flow than when attempting to wring comedic effect from the recitative. But the sun-kissed evening belonged to the two girls, Bevan and Grevelius, both of whom should hit the big time pretty damn soon.

Le nozze di Figaro, Garsington (Observer Review)

2010-06-06T10:13:00.001+01:00

by Fiona Maddocks

Garsington Opera launched its final season in its Oxfordshire home, before moving next year to Wormsley, home of the Getty family, with the opera that launched the enterprise 21 years ago: Figaro. This was a revival of John Cox's enchanting 2005 staging, with a fine young cast and a small, accomplished orchestra, the sound brightened with imaginative and prominent fortepiano-led continuo.

Douglas Boyd, a top oboist as well as a conductor, brought a player's sensibility to instrumental detail and chose unrushed, sympathetic tempi in a fresh interpretation that will deepen. James Oldfield's quizzical and unshowy Figaro has promise in a cast headed by Sophie Bevan as a perky Susanna, Anna Grevelius touching and funny as Cherubino and Grant Doyle as a reliable, attractive Count.

It was fascinating to compare, 48 hours apart, the ROH's deluxe staging and larger-scale performance with Garsington's robust intimacy and divine garden setting. Yet the chief revelation was not differing aspects of interpretation but the inexhaustible treasures of Mozart's flickering, glittering score, which leave quite enough over for the next production, and the production after that.

Le nozze di Figaro at Garsington Manor (Times Review)

2010-06-04T10:07:00.014+01:00

The production’s trump cards are old-fashioned honesty and good sense. Nothing is showily updated. No directorial concept grinds away to obscure the characters’ foibles

Geoff Brown

Twenty-one years of heaven. That’s how Garsington Opera’s general director, Anthony Whitworth-Jones, phrased it on this first night of the company’s final season at the late Leonard Ingrams’ Oxford manor, where the Bloomsbury set once disported under the patronage of Lady Ottoline Morrell. Heaven certainly gave us marvellous weather. Had Le nozze di Figaro opened the previous night, Mozart’s marvel would have been snivelling in the rain. As it was, John Cox’s 2005 production basked in the evening sun.
Whatever the future pleasures of the company’s next home at Mark Getty’s Wormsley estate, designers will be hard-pressed to duplicate Garsington’s special interplay between artifice and nature. No need to imagine Cherubino jumping from the balcony into a garden near the close of Act II: the garden is there at stage left, green and trim.

There have been funnier and flashier Figaros than Cox’s. Its trump cards are old-fashioned honesty and good sense. Nothing is showily updated. No directorial concept grinds away to obscure the characters’ foibles as they flitter, hide and disguise themselves among Robert Perdziola’s flexible sets. There is nothing overly fancy, either, in Douglas Boyd’s taut conducting, or the sprightly continuo of fortepiano and cello driving forward the recitatives.

It’s a production, too, that’s highly welcoming to the young talent on fizzing display. Susanna had already been in Sophie Bevan’s repertoire at the Royal College of Music; fresh as a daisy, she darts around as the Countess’s maid, all assets sparkling, vocal and physical. Note her younger sister Mary too, tenderly moving in Barbarina’s little aria. Anna Grevelius’s silver-gleam mezzo gets a good outing as Cherubino, nicely naughty. The ideal Figaro should probably have more impishness than James Oldfield, but this young professional grew more mobile with each act, and you can’t deny the promise of that robust bass-baritone voice. Up at the top of the Almaviva household, Grant Doyle shades the licentious Count with plenty of dark virility. As the long-suffering Countess, Kishani Jayasinghe wields a soprano voice with the constricted feel of a ship in a bottle; but there’s a big benefit in her dazzling smile, watchful eyes and general physical charisma.

Older hands in the ensemble easily slot into place. Stripped of her Act IV aria, Jean Rigby has relatively little to do as Marcellina, but she’s worth every look and twirl in her gaudy make-up and costume. Solid delights on offer too from Conal Coad’s Bartolo and Daniel Norman’s conniving Basilio.

The Marriage of Figaro - Garsington Opera

2010-06-03T15:17:00.005+01:00

by Edward Bhesania

Garsington Opera’s 22nd and final season at Garsington Manor, prior to relocating to the Getty family’s Wormsley Estate in the Chiltern Hills, could hardly have got off to a more joyous start.

John Cox’s Marriage of Figaro from 1995, boasts elegant period costumes, with sets (ingeniously flexible in their modular, reversible design) to match. Portraits of Count Almaviva’s distinguished antecedents loom from the walls of his castle, as if frowning upon his desire for extramarital bliss. Taking full advantage of the terrace stage’s situation, when Cherubino (Anna Grevelius) jumps from the Countess’ window, he actually lands in the adjacent parterre garden - for once, visibly in view of the gardener Antonio. And just as dusk settles over the stage, the Act IV sets turn to reveal the foliage of the garden scene, magically blending the stage into its crepuscular surroundings.

This would count for less if Cox’s direction were less assured. The web of secret desires, deceits and mockery is cleanly spun. The comic tension in the scene where Cherubino and then the Count are forced to hide (unknown to each other) as Susanna (Sophie Bevan) receives her unexpected visitors is a model of ratcheting comic tension. And, while sending Cherubino off to his military commission, Figaro shaves him, picking up on his former self in Beaumarchais’ The Barber of Seville.

Kishani Jayansinghe needs a smoother vocal line to give expression to the role of the abandoned Countess, but James Oldfield is a confident Figaro and Grant Doyle is a rich-toned Count, while Jean Rigby and Conal Coad bring a whiff of (classy) pantomime to the roles of Marcellina and Dr Bartolo.
To round things off, Douglas Boyd extracts beguiling balances and stark colouring from the Garsington Opera Orchestra. This is a production as thoroughly distinguished, yet engaging, as you could expect to enjoy.

Ruddigore - Gramophone Review

2010-03-15T04:52:00.021Z

A terrific, horrific Ruddigore

Gilbert and Sullivan’s flopera is restored to its rightful place

James Inverne

Opera North's new production

of Ruddigore.

Grant Doyle as Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd

[seated] with ghosts (photo: Robert Workman)

Good Lord, was I looking forward to this. By which I mean, I drove the four hours to Nottingham for it and the four hours back and I did it gladly. Because for as long as I can remember, Ruddigore, that satire of the Victorian melodrama complete with spectres, curses and witches burnt alive, has been my favourite of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. A resounding flop at its first appearance, largely (if legend is to be believed) because of the sweary title, which first appeared as Ruddygore, the reputation of this ghostly comedy has never quite recovered. Delicate bunch, the Victorians.

In my lifetime I only remember one professional British production, by New D’Oyly Carte, which I (inexcusably) missed. But my admiration survived even the distinctly dodgy amateur staging which graced Poole in my childhood, and was fanned by the wonderful 1982 television film starring Keith Michell, Sandra Dugdale, Donald Adams and – unforgettable as the macabre bad baronet Sir Despard, Vincent Price (yes, that Vincent Price).

So the news that Opera North had revived this skeleton in the G&S closet was enough for me to hotfoot it (albeit late in the run) to Nottingham’s Theatre Royal, four year-old son in tow for his first opera (yes, I’m afraid he is also being weaned on that 1982 film and is already a convert). Neither of us were disappointed.
Director Jo Davies has updated the action to post-World War One, when silent movies were the thing (an apt substitution for the similarly overheated Victorian stage). It’s a brilliant move, a shift forward that allows today’s audiences to easily connect with vampy femmes fatales (Heather Shipp’s terribly tragic Mad Margaret), over-eager sailors (Hal Cazalet’s thigh-slapping Richard Dauntless) and upstanding heroines who positively ooze decency (Amy Freston’s hilariously prim yet spunky Rose Maybud).
Davies even begins the opera with a silent film depicting the early courtship of Sir Roderick Murgatroyd and Dame Hannah, who are due to be married until (as the captions inform us) Roderick’s brother, the baronet Sir Ruthven, is supposedly drowned and his sibling must take the title with its attached curse – by which he must commit a bad deed every day or die in agony. Roderick, here a beefy Great War officer, shoots himself with his service revolver. Trust me, it’s very, very funny and the evening is off to a wonderfully over-the-top start.

The cast has clearly watched a lot of silent films. Every movement was filled with an awareness of the various swoons, semaphore gestures and character-defining walks that used to fill the silver screen (my favourite was Shipp’s decidedly unbalanced, jerky pushing of a pram along the boulevard, in time with the staccato music).

One reason that Ruddigore has never previously caught on, I think, is that the traditional comic baritone’s role doesn’t really exist here. The baritone is actually the romantic lead, the bashful Robin Oakapple who is later revealed to be – gasp -Sir Ruthven in disguise. In the past the role was often nabbed by the reigning G & S comedian, John Reed and the like, who tended to be (or anyway, to sound) too old for the role. It’s a tricky one, because the shy young hero of the first half must, once his secret is out, become the cackling if cack-handed bad baronet of the second. Grant Doyle manages the balancing act perfectly; sweet, funny and warm of voice throughout it all (loved the stick-on villain’s moustache).

Richard Angas as Robin’s long-suffering manservant Adam takes to his latter role as dead-eyed, axe-wielding henchman with gusto. Steven Page clearly has a whale of a time as Roderick, barking out commands to Ruthven and to his fellow ghosts as though still on the parade ground – though he and Anne Marie Owens’s formidable Dame Hannah manage a truly touching moment amid the knockabout for their second-act reunion.
The mostly young cast pay dividends in energy and enthusiasm. Though in terms of G&S vocal style the veterans tended to show the young bloods the way – Page strutting through ìThe Ghost’s High Noonî, Owens summoning exactly the right Verdian chills as Dame Hannah – there were no weak links. Conductor John Wilson made a great splash at the Proms last year with his MGM musicals night and here was similarly driven – his passion for this work was clear and infectious enough to overcome the odd lapse in coordination between pit and stage.

This was, in fact, as enjoyable an operatic comedy night as I can remember and a reclamation of a satirical masterpiece. I hope it comes home, as it were, to London (the Savoy Theatre, perhaps?). I hope it is filmed for all to enjoy. I hope I get to see it again. Oh, and my son now wants to see another opera. Which is safe to choose at that age, I wonder? My first, aged five, was Il Trovatore. Which is basically Ruddigore without the laughs.

James Inverne

James Inverne is the Editor of Gramophone

Ruddigore: Lancashire Telegraph Review

2010-02-25T18:20:00.016Z

Opera review: Ruddigore @ Lowry, Salford

For long in the shadow of its immediate predecessor The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan's Ruddigore has never had the success it surely deserves. That situation should now change after Opera North's new production at The Lowry.

Gilbert's plot is set in the Cornish town of Rederring where the Murgatroyd family, baronets of Ruddigore, have been cursed to commit a crime a day.
It is a wicked satire on the Victorian fascination for gothic melodrama and all things supernatural.

On the surface there are the stock characters of melodrama: an innocent maiden, the jolly seaman replete with mummerset accent and a kitbag of nautical cliches, apparitions a-plenty not forgetting the obligatory cape swirling villain. But all is not what it seems in this topsy turvy world. Gilbert invests his characters with most disturbing signs of insanity. There are multiple changes of prospective spouses preceded by the chasing of any eligible (or ineligible) female and a visitation by long dead ancestors.

Updated from the early 19th century to sometime after the Great War Jo Davies' terrific production is enhanced by Richard Hudson's superb sets that are evocatively lit in sepia tones by Anna Watson.
The first of many laughs of the evening comes during the overture when a flickering sideshow sets the scene for the events that are to unfold.

Sullivan's music is some of the finest he wrote for the Savoy operas and it fizzes along under John Wilson's direction, especially in the Act 2 ghost scene where Steven Page's marvellous Sir Roderic is on commanding form. Grant Doyle's suave Sir Ruthven together with Amy Freston's svelte Rose Maybud are gorgeously sung and acted. Anne Marie Owens' authoritative yet tender Dame Hannah and Richard Angus' towering hulk of a servant are consistently fine. As the randy skirt-chasing jack tar Hal Cazelet brought boundless energy and brio to the not particularly likeable Dick Dauntless. But then, in this probing production which also explores the ambiguities in Gilbert's masterly libretto, are the protagonists really likeable?

Heather Shipp's Mad Margaret was curiously unsettling yet often hilarious especially when partnered with the excellent Sir Despard of Richard Burkhard in the second act duet. This production must surely restore Ruddigore to its rightful place as one of the great Savoy operas. Set to become a classic, it is a ruddy good show.

Don't miss it!

Ken Bayliss.

Ruddigore, Grand Theatre (Independent on Sunday)

2010-02-07T14:31:00.007Z

Spared some creaking old traditions, a bright new production of a Gilbert and Sullivan oddity comes up roses.

Reviewed by Anna Picard.

There was a mild kerfuffle over the breakfast tables of Middle England in December when Peter Mandelson was mystified by a mention of Pooh-Bah on Radio 4's Today programme.

The reactions of the political commentators were interesting. While some took the opportunity to riff on Mandelson as a sophisticate – inclined to Verdi, if not verismo – most found it barely credible that a middle-class man in his mid-fifties would not catch a reference to the "Lord High Everything Else" of Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta, The Mikado.

Is it reasonable to assume that the patter songs of G&S are hard-wired into the national consciousness? Not any more. Boosted by Mike Leigh's film Topsy-Turvy, Jonathan Miller's 1986 Mikado has performed well for English National Opera in revival, yet neither The Pirates of Penzance nor The Gondoliers has repeated its success. For the most part, Gilbert and Sullivan has become a heritage industry, something for nostalgics, rarely played or sung at home. How intriguing, then, that Opera North should choose to stage Ruddigore now.

Often dubbed the most operatic of the Savoy operettas, Ruddigore 's subject is not class, bureaucracy, the weather or anything that can be labelled a characteristically British preoccupation, but Gothic melodrama, lovesick insanity and the moonstruck instrumentation of Lucia di Lammermoor. Opportunities for inserting topical jokes are happily few in this tale of a family cursed to commit "one crime a day". There is an obligatory reference to MPs' expenses, however, in Jo Davies's tender, witty staging, which heeds Gilbert's warning that "directly the characters show that they are conscious of the absurdity of their utterances the piece begins to drag".

Opera North has a tight, neat and sweet hit on its hands. Having sassed its way through Weill and Gershwin, the orchestra brings charm and delicacy to Sullivan's pastel apparitions and "blameless dances" under conductor John Wilson. Styled after hand-tinted postcards by designer Richard Hudson, the production is set in the aftermath of the First World War. Though there are shades aplenty in Ruddigore Castle, the ghosts of G&S past are largely exorcised in this brisk tangle of concealed identities, inherited tragedy and love-beyond-the-grave. Instead we have young voices, pertly clipped spoken dialogue, ensembles of madrigalian precision, delightfully agile choreography (Kay Shepherd), and a series of sparkling star turns from Amy Freston (Rose Maybud), Grant Doyle (Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd), Richard Burkhard (Sir Despard Murgatroyd), Heather Shipp (Mad Margaret), Hal Cazalet (Richard Dauntless) and Steven Page (the late Sir Roderic Murgatroyd). Can one production revive a dying genre? The music is too slight to matter, matter, matter. But I'll be smiling next time anyone mentions Basingstoke.

Ruddigore: Aren't they just darling? (Sunday Times review)

2010-02-07T14:22:00.006Z

From The Sunday Times

February 7, 2010

Opera North’s 1920s opera is an inspired revival that merrily papers over the cracks of Gilbert & Sullivan’s first flop

Marriage a la mode: Grant Doyle and Amy Freston are both superb

by Hugh Canning

In January 1887, Ruddigore followed Gilbert and Sullivan’s smash hit of 22 months earlier, The Mikado, mustering only 288 performances compared with its predecessor’s 672, then the second longest run in British theatre history. The New York Times declared it “Their First Flat Failure”, adding portentously that the operetta’s name “is decidedly against it”. Originally entitled Ruddygore, it — hilariously — became acceptable for the Victorians by the substitution of the offending “y” with an innocuous “i”. Gilbert must have been chuckling all the way to the bank.

Ruddigore has remained on the margins of the Savoy Opera repertoire, which makes Opera North’s production all the more welcome. At Leeds’s Grand Theatre, the director Jo Davies and the designer Richard Hudson have achieved the near miracle of concocting the most original and convincing G&S revival since Jonathan Miller’s “Roaring Twenties” Mikado for English National Opera in 1986.

Davies and Hudson also opt for the 1920s, evoking the melodrama of the silent-movie era during the overture — Sullivan’s atmospheric and operatic original, rather than Geoffrey Toye’s usually recorded potpourri of the operetta’s hit tunes for the 1920 D’Oyly Carte revival — and screening the back story of Dame Hannah’s abortive engagement and marriage to Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, 21st Baronet of Ruddigore, who succumbs to the Witch’s Curse of a violent death for failing to commit at least one crime a day. In one of Gilbert’s most contrived denouements, his ghost, having emerged from his portrait to spook the incumbent baronet, is brought back to life to be reconciled with his former betrothed, now the guardian aunt of the operetta’s ditzy heroine, Rose Maybud, whose fast-shifting morals are guided by a book of etiquette.

Even in its revised form, Ruddigore betrays the formulaic routine that was to bedevil the later Utopia Limited and The Grand Duke, and lacks the consistent musical inspiration of The (dramatically flawed) Gondoliers.

Opera North’s staging successfully pastes over the compositional and theatrical cracks of Act I, set in the Cornwall village of Rederring, where Rose can’t make up her mind between the claims of two potential bridegrooms: Robin Oakapple/Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd and his foster brother, Dick Dauntless. She is also the intended prey of Sir Despard — baronet in default of Sir Ruthven, his older brother — who plans to fulfil the dictates of the curse by abducting and forcibly marring her. The tone set by Davies and Hudson’s elegant sets and costumes hovers between EF Benson and PG Wodehouse, all tongue-in-cheek lampooning, with an ever-present band of bridesmaids eagerly showering confetti at the slightest hint of imminent wedding bells. Davies has worked hard getting opera singers to deliver the dialogue snappily, with cut-glass diction, but the first half still drags a bit, thanks to Gilbert’s convoluted plotting and less than side-splittingly funny dialogue. The improbabilities and characters are gently sent up rather than grotesquely caricatured — underplaying the satire nearly always yields dividends in G&S.

Hudson’s magnificent set and Sullivan’s brilliant parodies of the spook scenes of Weber’s Der Freischütz and Wagner’s Flying Dutchman bring the show into thrilling focus, however. Sir Roderic’s hit number, When the Night Wind Howls, is thrillingly delivered by Steven Page, and the other musical highlight is his duet with Anne Marie Owens’s uncaricatured, touchingly musical Hannah. Although Rose is a pale rerun of The Mikado’s Yum-Yum, Amy Freston’s light soubrette simpers and sings sweetly, while Grant Doyle is a dashing, young-Alan-Bates-lookalike Sir Ruthven and Richard Burghard manages the transition from snarling bad baronet to urbane bad baronet’s younger bro with nice eyebrow-curling urbanity. Richard Angas is a joy as Robin/Ruthven’s amiable manservant, Adam Goodheart.

Heather Shipp makes a brave stab at a silent-film tragedy-queen Mad Margaret without redeeming one of Gilbert’s most implausible creations. John Wilson, a “light opera” specialist, could have whipped up the tempo of the patter songs, but the pace should tighten during the run. When it does, it will be a classic.

Ruddigore: Opera Britannia

2010-02-05T23:00:00.002Z

Twenty-four years have passed since Opera North last performed a Gilbert & Sullivan operetta, but their sparkling new production of Ruddigore was definitely well worth the wait - a real treat from start to finish. Director Jo Davies has updated the action to the 1920s in a slick and witty staging that contains enough of the traditional-style dancing and unison hand gestures to keep G&S purists happy, while at the same time bringing a freshness and vitality to the piece, including several interpolated topical jokes about MPs’ expense claims which had the audience in stitches.

Ruddigore - or The Witch’s Curse was the tenth collaboration between Gilbert and Sullivan, but coming less than two years after The Mikado it inevitably suffered by comparison and struggled to live up to the success of its more famous predecessor. The first performance at the Savoy Theatre in January 1887 was met with a somewhat hostile reception - the New York Times branded it a failure and reported hissing and shouting from disappointed audience members. Though other critics were far less severe, the general consensus was that Ruddigore was charming but flawed, and several changes and cuts were made in order to improve the piece. Even the original title (spelled Ruddygore) proved rather controversial - upsetting all the 19th century Mary Whitehouse types who felt that ‘ruddy’ was too shockingly similar to ‘bloody’, which is why it was quickly changed to a less ‘offensive’ spelling.
Though Ruddigore will never be as popular as The Mikado, HMS Pinafore or The Pirates of Penzance, it still boasts a delightfully tuneful score, amusing dialogue and a preposterously silly melodramatic plot. Sir Roderic’s song “When the night wind howls” is a real musical gem and displays some extraordinarily imaginative orchestral writing, perfectly capturing the atmosphere of the unfurling ghost story. But the most famous musical number is probably the brilliant patter trio from Act II “My eyes are fully open to my awful situation” which contains the fantastic line “This particularly rapid unintelligible patter isn’t generally heard and if it is it doesn’t matter”

Set in Cornwall in a village called Rederring (geddit?) the plot is a parody of a Victorian gothic melodrama, revolving around the ‘Bad Baronets’ of Ruddigore who are condemned by an ancient curse to commit one crime each day or else perish in agony. Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, the rightful heir to the baronetcy, has run away and disguised himself as Robin, a simple farmer, in order to escape the curse - causing his younger brother Despard to inherit the title. Robin/Ruthven and his foster-brother Richard (a sailor) are both in love with the virtuous, etiquette-obsessed Rose Maybud, who cannot make up her mind whom she wishes to marry and switches her affections between the two men every five minutes. And of course there is poor abandoned Mad Margaret who enters in a disheveled state to the strains of a flute solo, an obvious little nod to Lucia di Lammermoor. Add to the mix some ghosts, the obligatory interrupted wedding scene and several totally implausible plot twists and we reach a classic formulaic G&S happy ending where all the principals neatly pair off and marry each other. If only real life were that simple!

During the overture we were shown the ‘back story’ of Dame Hannah and Sir Roderic as an old-fashioned black and white silent film projection – a clever means of exposition. After staging the opening scene in Rose’s bedroom, the Act I set designs by Richard Hudson gave us a seafront promenade (complete with plastic seagull!) and the elegant interior of a village church. Act II was set entirely inside the dark and gloomy picture gallery of Ruddigore Castle, the long latticed windows dramatically crashing open amidst some genuinely scary thunder and lightning. Staging the scene where the ghostly ancestors come to life and step out of their picture frames is a challenge for any director, but it was brilliantly achieved here by means of translucent screens – a clever coup de theatre. Costumes by Gabrielle Dalton were elegant and mainly typical of the 1920s period.

To stage any G&S production truly successfully it is essential to have singers who are also good actors, otherwise there is a real danger that much of Gilbert’s dialogue can fall flat in the wrong hands. Fortunately Opera North’s cast fielded some wonderful acting talent and it is hard to imagine a more ideal Robin/Ruthven than Grant Doyle. His warm, elegant baritone was attractive in timbre and he sang with great polish and finesse throughout; making light work of the fast patter songs and getting the text across with impeccably clear and suitably posh diction. His acting and comic timing were brilliant - obviously a G&S ‘natural’, Doyle made a very affable hero in Act I and a very sympathetic villain in Act II.

Soprano Amy Freston seemed slightly less at home with Gilbert’s dialogue, casually throwing away some of Rose’s best lines without pausing to make the most of their comedy potential. Her bright and chirpy voice is silvery in timbre, although occasionally too piercing in quality for my taste. However, it does not help that the role requires the soprano to sing so many higher notes on unflattering ‘e’ and ‘i’ vowels (as I discovered myself when I sang this part a few years ago in an amateur production). A smoother legato line would have been preferable during Rose’s solo which begins the madrigal “When the buds are blossoming”, particularly in the run up to the A, but otherwise Ms Freston turned in a vivacious and winsome performance.

As Richard Dauntless (or Dick, as he is usually called), Hal Cazalet acted the part superbly and was every inch the cocky, uncouth and over-confident sailor. His light tenor is pleasing on the ear with nice clean diction, although some of his sustained high notes sounded underpowered. A very agile performer, Cazalet deserves special praise for his extremely impressive Hornpipe dancing skills.

Richard Burkhard makes a splendidly over-the-top Sir Despard. Another G&S ‘natural’, he was clearly relishing every word of his text and sang with a rich, resonant bass - powerful enough to make a dramatic impact during his song “Oh why am I moody and sad?” but still possessing suitable agility to easily cope with the rapid-fire patter numbers.

Mezzo-soprano Heather Shipp was a genuinely bizarre Mad Margaret; although her crazed acting was so exaggerated that it was difficult to feel sympathy for her as a tragic abandoned woman because all the emphasis was on the comic side of her character. Ms Shipp possesses a rich and vibrant mezzo but the nature of this role gives her few opportunities to show off the voice properly – although it is heard to its best advantage in the slow section of her aria “To a garden full of posies” which was heartfelt and sung with a beautiful dark timbre.

As the ghost of Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, Steven Page almost stole the show with a stylish and powerfully sung rendition of “When the night wind howls”. Making a dramatic entrance in a long dark cloak, Page’s tall and commanding stage presence was reminiscent of Mozart’s Commendatore and he exuded the same gravitas, acting the role as a stereotypical WWI army general who likes to bellow orders and bully his subordinates. His love interest Dame Hannah was sung by mezzo Anne-Marie Owens who settled into the role after a somewhat shaky and vocally uneven start. Coming into her own in Act II, her feisty acting was hilarious in the scene where she threatens the cowardly Sir Ruthven with a gun. There was also some very strong support from Richard Angas, wonderfully funny in the character role of Old Adam and Gillene Herbert (Zorah) who possesses a delightfully pure and elegant soprano.

The chorus of Opera North were on top form and clearly having just as much fun as the audience. In the pit, the orchestra under John Wilson gave a spirited rendition of the score with some delightfully vivid and precise playing. Wilson’s tempi tended to err on the side of caution when it came to the patter numbers – and a piece like “My eyes are fully open” loses some of its comedy potential if it is not taken at an exaggerated breakneck speed. The version performed used Sullivan’s original, somewhat sedate and leisurely overture, as opposed to Geoffrey Toye’s revised arrangement and also contained Sir Ruthven’s Act II song “Away remorse…..Henceforth all the crimes” which is often cut.

Opera North have scored an indisputable hit with this brilliantly funny show and the audience didn’t stop laughing from the overture until the moment they walked out of the theatre. Ruddigore will also be performed in Salford Quays, Newcastle and Nottingham throughout February and March – not to be missed!

Faye Courtney
Opera Britannia

Ruddigore: The Arts Desk

2010-02-05T08:15:00.004Z

Friday, 05 February 2010 08:15 Written by Graham Rickson

A magical Ruddigore: Richard Burkhard as Sir Despard Murgatroyd (left) and Grant Doyle as Robin Oakapple Robert Workman

The plot of this rarely performed Gilbert and Sullivan spoof melodrama is gloriously amusing. The male heirs of the Murgatroyd family suffer under a witch’s curse which forces them to commit a crime each day, or suffer an agonising death. Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd has fled the ancestral home and now lives under a pseudonym, meaning that his younger brother Despard has had to assume both the baronetcy and the duty to commit the daily crime. Unlike his older brother's dastardly penchant for stealing babies and robbing banks, he finds it hard to progress beyond forging cheques and fiddling expenses.

This Opera North production of Ruddigore is really delightful. Projecting witty silent-film footage over the overture to fill in the back story, director Jo Davies has updated the action to the 1920s. Richard Stilgoe’s lyrics bring the action even further forward, referring to duck houses and Jacqui Smith.

It’s clear from the start that this will be a delicious evening. The complicated ensemble scenes in Act One are full of imaginative detail - right down to the movements of feet and hands, tiny gestures which transform a production from the technically impressive to something magical. There is a lovely moment in the bridesmaids' recreation of a naval battle, the British fleet are defeated by Gallic halitosis. Or when Sir Despard passes on the family title to his sweet-natured brother Ruthven by carefully dressing him in a black cape, top hat and cane. The finale of the first act is stunning - musically clever as well as wonderfully funny. At times I was giggling so much I could barely see what was happening. The moment in Act Two where the ancestral portraits of the impressively solid Ruddigore Castle descend from their canvases to taunt Sir Ruthven is theatrical magic.

Casting is uniformly successful. Richard Burkard’s Sir Despard almost steals the evening, bursting through the canvas of a Punch and Judy theatre, hollow laugh ringing out as he twirls his moustache. Grant Doyle conveys an endearing, innocent charm as Sir Ruthven, especially in his early scenes with Amy Freston’s Rose Maybud as the two of them struggle to express their feelings for each other. Hats off too to Stephen Page’s Sir Roderic. There is superb lighting by Anna Watson, particularly during some superbly realistic coastal scenes. John Wilson conducts with pace and affection. As a lifetime G&S sceptic, this production may have converted me. It’s that good.

Ruddigore continues at the Grand Theatre in Leeds until 12 February. It then tours to Salford, Newscastle and Nottingham. Details here.

Ruddigore, Grand Theatre (FT Review)

2010-02-02T22:31:00.005Z

By Andrew Clark

Published: February 2 2010 22:31

Sparkling patter: Grant Doyle and Amy Freston

The UK’s Gilbert and Sullivan heritage is a blessing and a curse. The jokes find a natural home in middle England, but the D’Oyly Carte Company’s long monopoly left the operettas mired in tradition. When it closed in 1982, everyone had their pick and vulgarity took a bow. In recent years the popularity of G&S has dipped: storylines redolent of class and empire come across as old hat in a multicultural society. But when they are performed with verve and style, there’s still fun to be had. That, at least, is the message of Opera North’s first G&S for 24 years.

Written on the back of The Mikado’s success, Ruddigore has more than its share of formulaic writing, but it is a good choice for an opera company with a flair for operetta. It includes a famous ghost scene that, at a stroke, lifts the proceedings out of the frivolous. The morbid turn of Sullivan’s music didn’t go down well with Gilbert, but it has a strong dramatic quotient, giving welcome body to a work otherwise overloaded with grating bridesmaids’ choruses.

Jo Davies’ staging neither vamps up the scene nor trivialises it. What springs to mind is the Wolf’s Glen in Der Freischütz, the witches in Macbeth, the ghost-ship choruses in Der fliegende Holländer: it’s on that scale. Richard Hudson’s handsome set, lit by Anna Watson, translates the normal to the paranormal and back with a magician’s sleight of hand, while scary flutes and shadowy strings weave a chill web of mystique.

The scene brings out the best in Opera North’s ensemble, not least the orchestra under John Wilson. Steven Page creates a suitably authoritarian Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, while Anne-Marie Owens takes her overdue share of the limelight as a plucky Dame Hannah. Grant Doyle, too, plunders the psychic overtones of his surroundings to give substance to the otherwise flimsy Sir Ruthven.There is excellent support from Hal Cazalet, Heather Shipp and Richard Angas, but the 1920s tone of the production – underpinned by Gabrielle Dalton’s costumes and Kay Shepherd’s choreography – is set by Amy Freston’s Rose Maybud, all period looks and sparkling patter. ()

Opera North's Ruddigore (Telegraph Review)

2010-02-01T06:06:00.004Z

Ruddigore is one of Gilbert & Sullivan's lesser-known works, but Opera North brings it to effervescent life. Rating: * * * *

By Rupert Christiansen
Published: 6:06PM GMT 01 Feb 2010

Delightful: Opera North's Richard Burkhard and Heather Shipp.

An auditorium packed with an audience of all ages was crackling with anticipation before Opera North’s new production of Ruddigore. One of Gilbert & Sullivan’s lesser-known operettas was receiving its first professional performance for two decades: the question was whether the staging might prove a smash hit to match Jonathan Miller’s Mikado or Joseph Papp’s Pirates of Penzance, reinventing a Victorian period piece in a style that could please both traditionalists and modernisers.

Even though I don’t think it quite hits the jackpot, the result is without doubt a delightful show that will give great pleasure. This Ruddigore’s minor shortcomings are much less to do with the performance than the work itself, which suffers from a protracted first act in which Gilbert plods and Sullivan seldom rises above routine.

I felt that the director, Jo Davies, had struggled to know what to do with it. Translating a Cornish village during the Napoleonic wars to a vaguely Wodehousian 1920s ambience provides a bit of incidental fun (the overture is accompanied by a pastiche silent movie and Mad Margaret is vamped up like Theda Bara), but the updating is otherwise pointless: it brings nothing into sharper focus and doesn’t have the topsy-turvy logical inevitability that made Miller’s “Grand Hotel” Mikado so piquant.

Richard Hudson’s photogravure-toned designs look washed-out, and you wonder why some of the characters are talking “thee” and “thine”. The dialogue goes at a fair lick, and it’s all tuneful and amusing enough, but it doesn’t lift off. A 10-minute cut might have helped.

The second act is another story: it’s absolutely terrific. Hudson has conceived a magnificent interior for Ruddigore castle, and the animation of the ancestral portraits is a dazzling coup de théâtre. Sullivan suddenly wakes up and produces a tremendous Gothic ghost scene, and Gilbert does some of his most virtuosic patter (“My eyes are fully open”), as well as a spot-on satire of moral snootiness in Mad Margaret and Sir Despard’s duet.

The cast is top-notch, and Davies has clearly directed every member with sensitivity. The always likeable Grant Doyle blossoms with star quality as Robin Oakapple, nicely pitted against Amy Freston’s simpering Rose Maybud.

Heather Shipp has great fun as a tragedy queen of a Mad Margaret, with Richard Burkhard as the sly, dry Sir Despard. Steven Page, kitted out like Field Marshal Haig, sings Sir Roderic’s “When the night wind howls” with bravado, and Hal Cazalet (Richard Dauntless), Richard Angas (Old Adam) and Anne-Marie Owens (Dame Hannah) are excellent, too.

John Wilson conducts with a light touch, allowing everyone to get the words across without mikes or surtitles – even Gilbert himself would have applauded their virtually impeccable diction. Oh, and Richard Stilgoe has added a witty verse about the expenses scandal for Robin’s Act 2 number.

Whatever my reservations, this is operetta bliss. A must for all G&S fans.

Ruddigore, Opera North (Guardian review)

2010-01-31T21:30:00.002Z

Grand, Leeds

*****

by Tim Ashley

Sunday 31 January 2010 21.30

Cheered to the rafters ... Hal Cazalet and Amy Freston in Ruddigore.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton

It was once fashionable to be rude about Ruddigore, Gilbert and Sullivan's complex take on gothic melodrama and Victorian morbidity. Before its premiere in 1887, Gilbert expressed perplexity over the apparently heavyweight nature of Sullivan's score and it subsequently became a cliche to state that the work was "too operatic" for its own good. Nowadays of course it's those same uncertainties of tone that appeal to us. Ruddigore is part social satire, part horror story and its greatness lies as much in its ability to move and scare us as in its potential to make us laugh.

Jo Davies's terrific new production for Opera North is strong on the work's ambiguities. The basic premise – that the aristocratic Murgatroyds are cursed to commit an evil deed a day – allows Gilbert to focus his satire on the criminality of the powerful. Davies updates the operetta from the Napoleonic era to the aftermath of the first world war. The ghost of Sir Roderick (Steven Page) stalks his successors in full military rig, which hints at his family's involvement in the carnage. Sir Ruthven's (Grant Doyle) often-cut aria about "all the crimes one sees in the Times" acquires an extra verse about MPs' expenses, which was cheered to the rafters by the first-night audience.

Davies's understanding of Gilbert's attack on moral hypocrisy is also marvellously acute. Sir Ruthven (Grant Doyle) and Sir Despard (Richard Burkhard), like Jekyll and Hyde alter egos, swivel between amorality and cringe-making respectability. Rose Maybud (Amy Freston) looks like the young Wallis Simpson but glides from man to man motivated by the prissiest ideals of etiquette and decorum. Heather Shipp's Mad Margaret, wheeling the detritus of her life about in a pram, is the victim of a world only fractionally less crazed than she is. Wickedly funny yet unsettling, Shipp's performance is typical of the evening as a whole.

The singing is consistently fine: Doyle, gauchely attractive, and the glorious sounding Freston are outstanding. The occasional lack of panache in John Wilson's conducting will probably vanish during the run. Davies's treatment of the hauntings leaves you open-mouthed, though someone should do something about the over-amplified thunder that obliterates the altogether creepier goings-on in the score. That apart, however, this is one of the great Gilbert and Sullivan stagings – on a par with Jonathan Miller's famous production of The Mikado and just as worthy of cult status in years to come.

Ruddigore (What's On Stage review)

2010-01-30T08:14:00.003Z

Venue: Grand Theatre and Opera House
Where: Leeds
Date Reviewed: 30 January 2010
WOS Rating:

by Ron Simpson

Apart from its intrinsic merits, Ruddigore has much to recommend it for a mainstream opera company tackling Gilbert and Sullivan. Nearly 30 years after the demise of the original D’Oyly Carte Company brought an end to Gilbert’s canonical productions, the war between the guardians of the true faith and the barbarians at the gate has not fully abated: after all, no one except Richard Wagner left such a definitive guide to authentic opera production and, even in Bayreuth’s, the revolution came from within – and much earlier.

But Ruddigore has always been a little off-centre from the great Savoy tradition. Along with Princess Ida, it never had the sparkling success of every other opera from H.M.S. Pinafore to The Gondoliers. It’s almost unique in not having a crusty/pompous old gent of a certain age who tells us his life story before doing a funny little dance. Instead it has such oddities as a gloriously harmonised ghost chorus and aria, the definitive anti-patter song in the trio "My eyes are fully open" and a genuinely funny heroine.

Jo Davies’ terrific production sides neither with traditionalists nor subversives. Instead it is fresh, original, splendidly detailed and unfailingly witty. It helps, of course, to have a cast of outstanding singer/actors and a conductor as idiomatic as John Wilson. Traditionalists may find the mildly updated costumes (Gabrielle Dalton) disconcerting, but they mesh perfectly with the cod silent screen introduction and provide such joys as Rose Maybud looking every inch the Agatha Christie innocent and the late bad baronet, Sir Roderic, modelling for Douglas Haig. The old tradition of updating one verse of a patter song remains, very clever, too, and attached to a song newly restored to the opera. For, in at least one respect, this performance is more authentic than the D’Oyly Carte productions which over the years had whittled down Act 2 to a bare half hour of music.

Vocally the cast is universally impressive (Anne-Marie Owens’ Wagnerian mezzo a fine replacement for those fondly-remembered, very British contraltos) and all display impeccable comic timing. Amy Freston and Heather Shipp play the sub-text to hilarious effect, Freston’s Rose bursting with passion and joie de vivre beneath the veneer of correct etiquette, Shipp’s Mad Margaret switching alarmingly from sentimentality to dangerous lunacy. Grant Doyle and Richard Burkhard are excellent as the role-swapping brothers, Doyle an engaging young hero and the most tormented of bad barts, Burkhard playing every last cloak-twirling moment to the hilt while longing for nothing more than a comfortable chair and the evening paper. Hal Cazalet’s relentlessly energetic Dick Dauntless is ready to dance a hornpipe at the drop of a cliché, Steven Page, an oddly sympathetic Sir Roderic, delivers his great set piece beautifully, Richard Angas’ devoted old servant finds lip-smacking relish in the transformation into evil steward and Gillene Herbert’s pert Zorah leads an uninhibited troupe of bridesmaids.

In fact, the whole production’s a joy, from Richard Hudson’s period designs with footlights and front-cloth to the inspired use of the chorus, precise, individualised and seldom predictable.

Werther - Opera North

2009-11-19T12:21:00.000Z

19 November 2009

by Lynne Walker

"Werther" by Massenet
The Lowry Theatre, Salford

“Out of a decent ensemble cast, Grant Doyle makes the best of the limited character of Albert…”

La Boheme - Opera Holland Park (Opera Magazine)

2009-08-01T20:59:00.000+01:00

August 2009

"...Grant Doyle a bright-voiced, outgoing Marcello..."

La boheme: Holland Park Opera

2009-07-30T16:42:00.001+01:00

by David Gutman

"Grant Doyle, a recent member of the Royal Opera Young Artists programme, makes a personable Marcello."

Faure Requiem/Sea Symphony - Barbican Centre

2009-07-09T16:46:00.003+01:00

by Kate Sole

"Doyle’s subtle interpretation suited the piece wonderfully"

La boheme: Holland Park Opera

2009-07-08T16:30:00.004+01:00

Christopher Gray

"Marcello (Grant Doyle)...and...Hye-Youn Lee’s Musetta's musical pairing with her man...works well, suggesting a treat is in store from Aussie Doyle’s appearance as the Count in next year’s Figaro at Garsington."

La boheme: Holland Park Opera

2009-06-28T16:38:00.001+01:00

MusicalCriticism.com

By Delia Casadei

"...has the possible side-effect of shifting the focus onto Marcello —who, accessing the canvas from a small ramp, is the focus of the opening scene—and away from Rodolfo, who is more discreetly hunched over his papers on the centre-right of the stage. This is not helped by the fact that Grant Doyle’s Marcello has charisma to match his oversized canvas.

But all is well: for these two performers are as well matched musically as their on-stage personalities. Doyle’s agile, speech inflected (but still very much sung) Marcello is complemented by Aldo di Toro‘s strong, quivering tone—one of the finest I have heard in a while. And as soon as the two start bantering, their on-stage chemistry is too absorbing for us to decide, or care who the main character is."

Paradise Moscow - Grand Theatre, Leeds

2009-04-21T16:10:00.002+01:00

Tuesday 21 April 2009

by Alfred Hickling

"...Grant Doyle and Bibi Heal are vocally weightier but no less engaging as mooning newlyweds whose dream is to one day live together..."

The Eternity Man 9.45pm, ABC1

2009-01-18T23:33:00.001Z

SUNDAY, JANUARY 18
The Eternity Man 9.45pm, ABC1

"The dominating voices are those of blowsy, bluesy Myrtle (Hughes) and Stace, beautifully acted and sung by Grant Doyle."

The Eternity Man - Channel 4

2009-01-08T23:39:00.001Z

January 8, 2009

"Lament for a sad man's century."

by Euan Ferguson

"It is a mesmerising, beautifully filmed work, and baritone Grant Doyle turns in a heartbreakingly good performance as Stace..."

The Marriage of Figaro - State Opera of South Australia

2008-08-31T00:28:00.001+01:00

Sunday, 31 August 2008

The Marriage of Figaro | State Opera South Australia

Written by Stephanie Johnson

"...and Grant Doyle is striking and strong as the philandering Count Almaviva."

St John Passion - Irish Chamber Orchestra

2008-03-01T00:04:00.000Z

March 2008

St John Passion - Irish Chamber Orchestra

"...The role of the Christus finds Grant Doyle both dignified and detached..."

St John Passion - Irish Chamber Orchestra

2008-03-01T00:02:00.001Z

March 2008

St John Passion - Irish Chamber Orchestra

"...Some of the gems of this jewel-laden performance were......Doyle's authority facing Pilate...."

Don John of Austria - Sydney Symphony Orchestra

2007-10-01T23:59:00.001+01:00

October 2007

Don John of Austria - Sydney Symphony Orchestra

"...Grant Doyle is passionate and peevish as Philip II...."

Don John of Austria - Sydney Symphony Orchestra

2007-10-01T23:57:00.000+01:00

October 2007

Don John of Austria - Sydney Symphony Orchestra

"...baritone Grant Doyle sang with resounding, full-voiced power as King Philip II...."

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

2007-08-01T23:55:00.001+01:00

August 2007

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

"...Equally as impressive was the carefully phrased and thoughtfully acted Frederic of Grant Doyle...."

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

2007-07-07T23:53:00.000+01:00

musicalcriticism.com

7 July 2007

by Dominic McHugh
Lakme - Opera Holland Park

"...the superb Grant Doyle (a former Young Artist at the Royal Opera) really stepped up to the mark with his beautifully-sung Frédéric...."

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

2007-07-07T23:52:00.000+01:00

7 July 2007

by Neil Fisher

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

"...Grant Doyle is a fluent and rich-toned Frédéric...."

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

2007-07-05T23:50:00.001+01:00

5 July 2007

by George Hall

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

"...impressive performance from Grant Doyle as Gerald’s fellow soldier Frédéric.."

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

2007-07-05T23:11:00.001+01:00

5 July 2007

by Simon Thomas

Lakme - Opera Holland Park

"...well-supported by the excellent Grant Doyle as Frédéric"

Britten's War Requiem - Northern Sinfonia and Orchestra of Opera North, The Sage, Gateshead

2007-04-02T23:09:00.001+01:00

2 April 2007

by Gavin Engelbrecht

Britten's War Requiem

Northern Sinfonia and Orchestra of Opera North, The Sage, Gateshead

"..Wilfred Owen's stark anti-war poems...were conveyed with compelling conviction by baritone Grant Doyle...."

Concert: Borås Symphony Orchestra

2007-03-29T23:08:00.001+01:00

29 March 2007

by Helen Axelsson

Concert: Borås Symphony Orchestra
Venue: Åhaga Concert Hall, Sweden

"...the real highlight of this concert was found in the shining efforts of the soloists. With his supple and freely ringing baritone voice, Grant Doyle gave an unforgettable interpretation of Vaughan Williams' 'Songs of Travel', where with the greatest solicitude he painted the romanticism of the English countryside. ..."

A Child of Our Time - Crouch End Festival Chorus

2007-01-20T23:06:00.001Z

20 January 2007

by Dave Paxton

Concert: A Child of Our Time - Tippett
Crouch End Festival Chorus
Venue: Barbican, London

"...solo baritone Grant Doyle, whose strong and malleable voice moulded phrases of great dramatic potency throughout."

Fedora - Opera Holland Park

2006-08-01T23:21:00.000+01:00

August 2006

Fedora, Opera Holland Park

“…Grant Doyle was outstanding as the coachman Cirillo..”

A Midsummer Night's Dream - Linbury Studio

2005-12-05T23:05:00.001Z

5 December 2005

by George Hall

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Linbury Studio, Royal Opera

“The lovers too are a pleasing group vocally… the twists and turns of their amorous engagements and disengagements need the clearest exposition, and here only Grant Doyle's Demetrius makes a consistently full-on impression…”

A Midsummer Night's Dream - Linbury Studio

2005-12-04T23:04:00.000Z

4 December 2005

by Anthony Holden