Subscribe to
Opera Today

Receive articles and news via RSS feeds or email subscription.







Recently in Reviews

Proms at ... Cadogan Hall 5: Louise Alder and Gary Matthewman

“On the wings of song, I’ll bear you away …” So sings the poet-speaker in Mendelssohn’s 1835 setting of Heine’s ‘Auf Flügeln des Gesanges’. And, borne aloft we were during this lunchtime Prom by Louise Alder and Gary Matthewman which soared progressively higher as the performers took us on a journey through a spectrum of lieder from the first half of the nineteenth century.

Glowing Verdi at Glimmerglass

From the first haunting, glistening sound of the orchestral strings to the ponderous final strokes in the score that echoed the dying heartbeats of a doomed heroine, Glimmerglass Festival’s superior La Traviata was an indelible achievement.

Médée in Salzburg

Though Luigi Cherubini long outlived the carnage of the French Revolution his 1797 opéra comique [with spoken dialogue] Médée fell well within the “horror opera” genre that responded to the spirit of its time. These days however Médée is but an esoteric and extremely challenging late addition to the international repertory.

Queen: A Royal Jewel at Glimmerglass

Tchaikovsky’s grand opera The Queen of Spades might seem an unlikely fit for the multi-purpose room of the Pavilion on the Glimmerglass campus but that qualm would fail to reckon with the superior creative gifts of the production team at this prestigious festival.

Blue Diversifies Glimmerglass Fare

Glimmerglass Festival has commendably taken on a potent social theme in producing the World Premiere of composer Jeanine Tesori and librettist Tazewell Thompson’s Blue.

Vibrant Versailles Dazzles In Upstate New York

From the shimmering first sounds and alluring opening visual effects of Glimmerglass Festival’s The Ghosts of Versailles, it was apparent that we were in for an evening of aural and theatrical splendors worthy of its namesake palace.

Gilda: “G for glorious”

For months we were threatened with a “feminist take” on Verdi’s boiling 1851 melodrama; the program essay was a classic mashup of contemporary psychobabble perfectly captured in its all-caps headline: DESTRUCTIVE PARENTS, TOXIC MASCULINITY, AND BAD DECISIONS.

Simon Boccanegra in Salzburg

It’s an inescapable reference. Among the myriad "Viva Genova!" tweets the Genovese populace shared celebrating its new doge, the pirate Simon Boccanegra, one stood out — “Make Genoa Great Again!” A hell of a mess ensued for years and years and the drinking water was poisonous as well.

Rigoletto at Macerata Opera Festival

In this era of operatic globalization, I don’t recall ever attending a summer opera festival where no one around me uttered a single word of spoken English all night. Yet I recently had this experience at the Macerata Opera Festival. This festival is not only a pure Italian experience, in the best sense, but one of the undiscovered gems of the European summer season.

BBC Prom 37: A transcendent L’enfance du Christ at the Albert Hall

Notwithstanding the cancellation of Dame Sarah Connolly and Sir Mark Elder, due to ill health, and an inconsiderate audience in moments of heightened emotion, this performance was an unequivocal joy, wonderfully paced and marked by first class accounts from four soloists and orchestral playing from the Hallé that was the last word in refinement.

Tannhäuser at Bayreuth

Stage director Tobias Kratzer sorely tempts destruction in his Bayreuth deconstruction of Wagner’s delicate Tannhäuser, though he was soundly thwarted at the third performance by conductor Christian Thielemann pinch hitting for Valery Gergiev.

Opera in the Quarry: Die Zauberflöte at St Margarethen near Eisenstadt, Austria

Oper im Steinbruch (Opera in the Quarry) presents opera in the 2000 quarry at St Margarethen near Eisenstadt in Austria. Opera has been performed there since the late 1990s, but there was no opera last year and this year is the first under the new artistic director Daniel Serafin, himself a former singer but with a degree in business administration and something of a minor Austrian celebrity as he has been on the country's equivalent of Strictly Come Dancing twice.

BBC Prom 39: Sea Pictures from the BBC National Orchestra of Wales

Sea Pictures: both the name of Elgar’s five-song cycle for contralto and orchestra, performed at this BBC Prom by Catriona Morison, winner of the Cardiff Singer of the World Main Prize in 2017, and a fitting title for this whole concert by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by Elim Chan, which juxtaposed a first half of songs of the sea, fair and fraught, with, post-interval, compositions inspired by paintings.

BBC Prom 32: DiDonato spellbinds in Berlioz and the NYO of the USA magnificently scales Strauss

As much as the Proms strives to stand above the events of its time, that doesn’t mean the musicians, conductors or composers who perform there should necessarily do so.

Get Into Opera with this charming, rural L'elisir

Site-specific operas are commonplace these days, but at The Octagon Barn in Norwich, Genevieve Raghu, founder and Artistic Director of Into Opera, contrived to make a site persuasively opera-specific.

A disappointing Prom from Nathalie Stutzmann and BBCNOW

Nathalie Stutzmann really is an impressive conductor. The sheer elegance she brings to her formidable technique, the effortless drive towards making much of the music she conducts sound so passionate and the ability to shock us into hearing something quite new in music we think we know is really rather refreshing. Why then did this Prom sometimes feel weary, even disappointing at times?

Sandrine Piau: Si j’ai aimé


Merola’s Striking If I Were You

Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer have become an indispensable presence in the contemporary opera world, and their latest premiere, If I Were You, found the duo at the very top of their game.

The Thirteenth Child: When She Was Good…

Santa Fe Opera continues its remarkable record for producing World (and American) Premieres with The Thirteenth Child, music by Poul Ruders, libretto by Becky and David Starobin.

The Sopranos at Tanglewood

Among classical music lovers, Wagner inspires equal measures of devotion and disdain. Some travel far and sit for hours to hear his operas live. Others eschew them completely.



Prom 46: Sir Simon Rattle conducts the LSO Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Schoenberg’s <em>Gurrelieder</em>
21 Aug 2017

Schoenberg's Gurrelieder at the Proms - Sir Simon Rattle


Prom 46: Sir Simon Rattle conducts the LSO Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder

A review by Anne Ozorio

Above: Sir Simon Rattle conducts the massed forces of the CBSO Chorus, the London Symphony Chorus, Orfeó Català and the London Symphony Orchestra, in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder at the BBC Proms

Photo credit: Chris Christodoulou


No wonder tickets almost sold out as soon as they went on sale. Everyone in town seemed to be there. Thomas Quasthoff sat in the coffee shop, holding court with friends and fans. Simon Rattle got cheered when he came in sight on the stage, still in street clothes, by Prommers who were already seated half an hour early.

Gurrelieder is a spectacular so extravagant that, for maximum effect, it needs to be experienced in a performing space where the vast forces can let rip in all their glory. Rattle has conducted it many times in many places, but there's nothing like the Royal Albert Hall for sensational presence, so he was able to unleash the full forces of Gurrelieder without inhibition. For Gurrelieder is meant to be overwhelming, Waldemar defies God, who wreaks cosmic vengeance. He and his men are doomed to spend eternity riding through the night in a hunt. The peasants (here a single symbolic figure) are terrified by the supernatural, but Klaus-Narr, being a Fool, can recognise the ghosts for what they are - cosmic forces, and the demonic power of Nature.

Gurrelieder starts with a rhapsodic prelude, string lines swelling and heaving, harps adding warmth, woodwinds delicate, naturalistic touches. The reference is probably Siegfried's Journey down the Rhine, for Waldemar is about to embark on a journey of destiny. Like Siegfried, Waldemar spends his innocence hunting in the woods, where Tove is concealed. Hence the Wood Dove, like the Wood Dove in Siegfried, an all-seeing avatar. Dense forests, in Germanic culture, symbolise powerful, though sinister, primeval forces. The subconscious, source of creativity and danger.

Gurrelieder is song symphony of Wagnerian proportions. Simon O'Neill, being a very experienced Wagnerian, brought dramatic authority to the role. Waldemar is no Tristan but a king who thinks he can throw curses at God. If anything, he's a Flying Dutchman, doomed to sail the seas forever. O'Neill's Waldemar is an embattled soul, tormented and defiant, instinctively understanding the part. Waldemar is not a Romantic Hero, but a man cursed, struggling against Fate. Thus the roles of Waldemar and Tove, though well written musically, aren't particularly well developed in terms of psychological complexity. For Schoenberg, they are figures in a landscape, who will become incorporated into Nature and nature legend around them. Nonetheless, Eva-Maria Westbroek created Tove with great vocal depth, and Karen Cargill sang the Wood Dove, a bird of darker portent than Siegfried's wood dove.

Sir Simon Rattle conducts Eva-Maria Westbroek with the London Symphony Orchestra.jpg Sir Simon Rattle conducts Eva-Maria Westbroek with the London Symphony Orchestra. Photo credit: Chris Christodoulou.

Schoenberg was only twenty-six when he wrote what was to become the First Part of Gurrelieder, but in the interim, he developed a highly original identity. In Part Two, the harps still sing, but the sweeping strings are broken by fearsome chords which replicate the word "Herrgott! Herrgott!" which O'Neill sang with intense flourish. Note the text, carefully. Waldemar accepts his fate, but frames it as a creative destiny. He chides God. "Das heisst Tyran, nicht Herrscher sein!". Like any earthly king, God needs Fools to keep him in order. Thus the significance of Klaus-Narr and of the Narrator, both figures who can see beyond events and guess significance. In the years between the time Schoenberg began writing Gurrelieder and completing it, he developed a distinct creative identity. The true artist, as innovator, will often be alone, even vilified, but artistic integrity is paramount. thus "Lass mich, Herr, die Kappe deines Hofnarrn tragen!".

The peasant (Christopher Purves) is horrified by the sight of Waldemar's Ghost Riders in the sky (complete with echoes of hunting horn). His response is to hide, pray and bolt his door "noch Stahl und Stein, so kann mir nichts Böses zum Haus Herein!" "Holla!" to all that. The men's voices in the choirs sing a wild, rhythmic chorus, alternating explosive force with singing of hushed subtlety. O'Neill sang Waldemar's "Mit Toves Stimme" so it rang out as an anthem: the love that keeps Waldemar singing is like the inspiration an artists needs to create.

Thomas Quasthoff performs in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Simon Rattle.jpgThomas Quasthoff performs in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Simon Rattle. Photo credit: Chris Christodoulou.

The music that introduces Klaus-Narr is quirky but pointed, The Fool (Peter Hoare) is himself a ghost, serving his dead King in the same way that his king serves the God who doomed him. Hoare let the lines curl round his tongue, spitting them out in line with the odd angular rhythms in the music. Waldemar will not be cowed. Trumpets call, and hunting horns. Waldemar's still a huntsman and fighter who will barge his way into Heaven. The huge chords in the orchestra return, but fade away, for dawn is about to break. The Men's voices sang in dramatic hush as Waldemar's men sank back into the grave. Rattle and the LSO created a haunting orchestral Prelude, settingb the tone for the entry of the Narrator (Thomas Quasthoff). Brooding somnolemce, eddies of quirky sound, like will o' the wisps illuminating darkness. In many ways, the part is the heart and soul of the piece, for it's written as Sprechstimme, neither song nor speech, a device which Schoenberg was to make distinctively his own. This section is extraordinary, so unusual and so powerful that it leaves the listener stunned. Quasthoff did the Narrator (and the Peasant) with Rattle in Berlin in 2000. Though he's long ceased singing, he can still act, and speak the part with a singer's ear for song. It's quite a part. I will never forget hearing Hans Hotter do it way back in 1994, when he was already in his eighties. And then the chorus exploded in that glorious "Seht die Sonne!"

This Prom was recorded for repeat online broadcast, and filmed for TV broadcast on September 3rd (BBC TV 4).

Anne Ozorio

Send to a friend


Friend's Email Address: (required)

Your Email Address: (required)

Message (optional):