Opera Reviews
28 March 2024
Untitled Document

Radamisto misses the spark



by Catriona Graham
Handel: Radamisto
English Touring Opera
November 2018
Ellie Laugharne (Polissena), John-Colyn Gyeantey (Tigrane)

There are always, as our mothers have said, folks worse off than ourselves and, it seems, they inhabit Handel operas – Radamisto, for example. Here the love triangle has been replaced with a pentangle – briefly, Farasmane has a son, Radamisto married to Zenobia, and daughter Polissena married to Tiridate, who is lusting after Zenobia, while his friend and ally Tigrane desires Polissena.

There is a bit of a war going on in the background, but that is just collateral damage in Tiridate’s campaign to supplant Radamisto in Zenobia’s bed.

We meet Polissena first, in a sumptuous red velvet over-gown trimmed with gold and with matching boxy hat. She (Ellie Laugharne) is lamenting her woes – understandable when her husband (Grant Doyle) arrives and tells her, basically, to get lost. During her next song, in which she says she will go but leaves her heart behind, she seeks some response, but Doyle is implacably indifferent. Tiridate is clearly not a nice man, later dragging the captured Farasmane (Andrew Slater) round the stage on a rope.

Meanwhile, chez Radamisto, Zenobia has joined him on the battlements. With her cropped hair, Katie Bray looks more like his wee brother or son than his queen, but she has a rich vibrant voice. William Towers comes across as a bit wet as a king; he is much more impressive in disguise as his own servant Ismeno, having pretended to be dead.

Although Tigrane is really Tiridate’s gofer, John-Colyn Gyeantey imbues the character with some degree of development, not least in discovering he has some ethics and can no longer support his ally, even if Polissena is the reward.

The staging by director James Conway and designer Adam Wiltshire is simple – a pair of half-arches with steps are moved around to provide walls and dungeons as required. The backdrop is slightly mirrored, except for a central picture of a stormy sky above what turns out to be a sedimentary rock wall, across which Radamisto and Zenobia flee. Zenobia also flings herself into the river, rather than be captured by Tiridate, leaving Radamisto perched precariously, and singing Ombra cara di mia sposa while the harmonies slide all over the place.

Rory Beaton’s lighting is particularly effective framing Zenobia – now richly clad and with big dangly earrings – in a doorway, where she announces she has suffered much. She is about to suffer more, as Tiridate pounces, but is fought off by Ismeno/Radamisto, who is then unmasked by his frantic sister. By this time Tigrane has led the populace in insurrection against the mad tyrant Tiridate; there is an interesting moment when Doyle totally changes the quality of his voice to confess his sins, and then, in his normal voice, announces he is himself again.

The Old Street Band plays well for conductor Peter Whelan, with a special mention for Toby Carr on theorbo, who accompanies Radamisto’s aria Qua nave smarrita so sensitively. There are also some nice oboe solos from Leo Duarte.

The missing spark is, I think, down to Handel – it is maybe not one of his best.

Text © Catriona Graham
Photo © Richard Hubert Smith
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