Photo: © John Snelling
Eleazar Rodriguez (Edgardo) and Sarah Tynan (Lucia) in ENO Lucia di Lammermoor October 2018
It was a huge pleasure to return on Tuesday to the Coliseum to see David Alden's fascinating production of Lucia di Lammermoor, superbly executed in every department with a completely new cast. This production was a knock out back in 2008 when new, and has not been revived since 2010. ENO have lavished care on it with a magnificent new cast and a conductor, Scottish Opera's Stuart Stratford, who is surely destined for more at ENO in the future. This was a classic night of true "music theatre" - not one perhaps for pedantic bel canto purists, but certainly one for those that can have their guts wrenched by superbly effective theatre combined with music making of the highest quality and integrity. It was completely absorbing, and one appreciates above all David Alden's extraordinary work with the ENO chorus whose commitment framed the whole evening so splendidly. ENO at its very best!
Photo: Richard Hubert Smith
Caroline Wettergreen (La Fée) and Alix le Saux (Cendrillon) in Glyndebourne's Cendrilon
Glyndebourne's tour is celebrating 50 years this year - is it really so long as that since we set out to Newcastle to the first time in March 1968 with four productions? Alas they are down to just two this year, plus a "Behind the Curtain" show on La traviata which seems to me to be a great innovation. I guess it may be a second cousin of Gerard McBurney's magnificent "Beyond the Score" series of events for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra which we enjoyed so much. Whatever, it seems like a smart idea which I hope to get to somewhere!
Meanwhile Cendrillon is a new production which provides many pleasures. I was in Sussex yesterday evening to see it. The Glyndebourne management has given us an excellent cast, in particular a remarkable Swedish soprano Caroline Wettergreen as La Fée. This is top class in admittedly a rather specialist territory. But a first class choice. And there were two excellent French mezzos as Cendrillon and the Prince - Alix le Saux and Eléonore Pancrazi. I was greatly struck by the young conductor, Duncan Ward. Is this another in the long line of talents nurtured by Glyndebourne, nurtured over the years - names to conjure with such as John Pritchard, Andrew Davis and Simon Rattle? Time will tell, and Massenet is not the measuring stick of choice - but this is a young man to watch. I said this about Andris Nelsons back in 2005 and I got that right. As I did with Simon Rattle in 1975. But I am also sometimes wrong!
Fiona Shaw directed this beautiful production - it will be good to revisit it next summer when it is revived in the Festival. This is a charming piece, seductive in the extreme.
Photo: Richard Hubert Smith
Alix de Saux and Eléonore Pancrazi
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