Although opera is traditionally associated with grand narrative structures, sometimes its heightened psychological intensity can be remarkably effective at drawing us into an intimate historical moment, and just keeping us there a little while. Schutzwall tells the story of two sisters – Angelika Meyer (Mimi Doulton) and Suzanne Meyer (Ella Taylor) – suddenly separated by…
Not many operas credit their Neural Network Programming: but ‘i’ – The Opera, though recognisably and confidently an opera, thanks Janelle Shane and Dr Amita Kapoor of the University of California, San Diego, for that contribution. The opera tells of the creation of an android girl, a birthday present for a spoilt Princess in a…
The Winter’s Tale is surely one of Shakespeare’s cruellest tragedies: Leontes’ mistaken, yet unshakeable jealousy destroys family bonds and friendships alike, culminating in blasphemy as he refuses to accept the Oracle of Apollo which exonerates his blameless wife. Even the eventual restoration of his wife and daughter, an earthly miracle achieved only by the courage…
“I have tried to destroy the picture of the most beautiful woman in mythological history as a protest against the Government for destroying Mrs Pankhurst, who is the most beautiful character in modern history. Justice is an element of beauty as much as colour and outline on canvas.” So, in 1914, suffragette Mary Richardson explained…
Directed with witty skill by Bill Bankes-Jones, Tête à Tête’s Artistic Founder and Director, these two imaginative and appealing short operas made for an enchanting hour at Kings Place. Reducing her scale slightly (Moonlight has a much smaller cast, and is significantly shorter than last year’s The Fisherman’s Brides) seems to have allowed young Highland…
We don’t laugh at oddities of nature in circus sideshows any more: sadly, we haven’t grown out of the propensity, but it’s simply become all too easy (and, for some, lucrative) to do that on television. Any casual flick through the channels will show you society’s appetite for the freakish has not diminished, although it…
The Fisherman and his Wife is a nicely conceived opera for children. Eralys Fernandez’s score confidently paints a range of moods and emotions in a cheerful piano accompaniment played for us by the composer, encompassing rowdy exchanges verging on Punch & Judy, little lyrical arias (the Fisherman’s “Almighty God of the Sea” a particular highlight),…
Tête-à-Tête is branching out ever further into new venues. Having been to a dance theatre and a nightclub, we now found ourselves in a school theatre. Fittingly, the evening’s programme was academically focused: Llywelyn ap Myrddin’s Sonata for YouTube, inspired by John Cage, and Jonathan Man’s Turandot Reimagined, which seeks to take Puccini’s orientalist opera back…
Although the first piece (One Day This Will be Long Ago) was difficult and the second (China Doll) plain agony to sit through, the Tête-à-Tête Clubnight at Egg, London finished with two triumphantly strong and original visions of opera. Cavalier’s Rock Tosca is basically one of the best ideas anyone has ever had. Big, sweaty, loud and…
Composer Tim Benjamin gives us a masterclass in how to create a one-handed opera twice over in his Life Stories. Rest in Peace, inspired by a short story from Chekhov (Life in Questions and Exclamations, 1882), lets us hear the vivid flickers of a decaying, addled mind, fascinating both for their intensity and their randomness. If Harold Pinter had…