Diary of a Culture Hedonist

The evening started with Ravel's Mother Goose (orchestrated version). It was a straightforward play, but somehow I couldn't quite engage with the work. Magdalena Kožena delivered a fine rendition of Shéhérazade. Her dark timbre suited the exotic Arabian adventure. Text delivery was good, and Sir Simon Rattle conjured up this moody and magical world with the London Symphony Orchestra. L’enfant et les sortilèges was in the second half of the concert. As a concert performance, the rich and resourceful score was beautifully rendered by Sir Simon. Magdalena Kožena sang the boy, with a strong cast to portray the various tea cups, animals and insects. The London Symphony Chorus obliged with various noises, including a synchronised nose-pitching number. The cat duet (Anna Stéphany and Gavan Ring) was particularly fun!

Indeed it was a rare opportunity to see Samuel Barber's Vanessa. Keith Warner's direction was super - working in sync with Ashley Martin-Davis's stage design of big mirror cases - to bring this intriguing plot to life. Emma Bell was a pensive and stoic Vanessa, but occasionally out-shown by Virginie Verrez's portrayal of Erika. Jakub Hrůša led the London Philharmonic to deliver this lush Barber sound world.

What a superb revival production directed by Barrie Kosky. The big choruses were done with the singers doing slo-mo mannerism action. Markus Brück was particularly fine with Saul, and the rest of the cast did a super job to bring this oratorio to life.  Laurence Cummings maintained dramatic momentum with the OAE while darting from the rostrum to the organ - including playing the solo intro on a spinning organ on stage!

Saw a revival of Don Giovanni directed by Kasper Holten and set by Es Devlin. Ildebrando D’Arcangelo brought a dark tone to Leporello, while Mariusz Kwiecień was a handsome if slightly lost Don Giovanni. The entire cast had good, strong voices. Somehow, they all tended to look down, or look at Marc Minkowski in the pit. I wondered was it because Minkowski's cues were few and not forthcoming. Coincidentally, the ensemble had lots of rough edges and there seemed to be a lack of rapport between the cast and the audience. Oh and I did not like the last scene: Mariusz Kwiecień sang about imaginary supper, wine and handshake - but he was effectively dangling from the first floor of the set. The complete lack of representation of the final interaction between Don Giovanni the Commendatore (fine dark singing from Sir Willard) made for an unsatisfying end. A new production please.

There is a lot to like about Lohengrin - big choruses, brassy sound, bit soprano roles, big tenor roles. So it is always a challenge to take this much-loved Wagner opera to the next level. Jennifer Davis as Else von Brabant was excellent - her strong acting skills were matched by her vocal abilities and clear delivery of text (always important for Wagner). Christine Goerke gave us a gutsy and verminous Ortrud in sharp contrast to Davis. Thomas Mayer's Telramund started out bombastically in act one, but reduced to a suitably weak and introspective voice by the end of act two - which I think what the role demanded. Klaus Florian Vogt, the horn player turned tenor, gave us an otherworldly Lohengrin. The timbre of his voice sat "apart" from the rest of the cast - ethereal for quiet contemplative moments, heroic where needed. It's not a voice that you need to "like", but a voice that suited the role. David Alden's direction took advantage of the three d...

I think this David McVicar production of Giulio Cesare really brings to life this rather long Handel opera. This revival retains all the freshness and fun of the well-known Caesar meets Cleopatra tale, enough action to be entertaining, but subtle for those introspective moments.  Sarah Connolly was Giulio Cesare - which was sung with intelligence and pose. Cleopatra was sung by an athletic Joélle Harvey - don't know how she managed to dance and sing those difficult arias at the same time. The highligh was the playing of OAE, under the baton of William Christie, which delivered the superb Baroque sound world that really let the music shine.

I went to see Danielle de Niese in La bohème. This was a revival of Richard Jones's production: it's lighthearted without straying too far away from the verismo genre. De Niese made a fabulous Musetta (at first I thought she was going to be Mini, which would have been questionable) - the flamboyant stage presence coupled with a fine voice added real fizz to act 2. Nicola Luisotti help delivered a fine and clear orchestra sound from the pit. Quite enjoyable.