Opera reviews: Bizet’s Carmen and Mozart’s The Abduction From The Seraglio

4 / 5 stars
Bizet’s CARMEN

OPERA up close has come a long way since its first venture five years ago with a cutdown La Boheme scored for one piano in a Kilburn pub.

CarmenPH

Bizet’s emotionally charged Carmen is performed in the stripped-down set of London’s Soho Theatre

The company’s new production of Carmen is co-produced with London’s Soho Theatre and Coventry’s Belgrade Theatre, where a UK tour will open next January.

Artistic Director Robin Norton-Hale has updated Bizet’s tragedy to a present day Spanish setting.

Her freely translated English libretto works well, and some of the cast of nine double as chorus when needed.

Harry Blake has orchestrated a reduced score for piano, cello, flute and violin.

Christopher Hone’s utility set adapts neatly from Seville town square to smugglers’ tavern, mountain hideaway and bullring exterior.

The stripped down staging brings out the raw passion of the opera, which Norton-Hale suggests is not so much a love story as an examination of domestic abuse; Carmen is murdered by her ex-partner as are more than two women a week in England and Wales.

To emphasise her feminist thesis, tenor Anthony Flaum is a more than usually wired-up Don Jose.

From the start, it appears he has a problem with “anger management”. As the opera is performed nightly, the run requires two casts alternating in the roles.

Flora McIntosh was Carmen on the night I attended, impressing with a fine mezzo voice and strong acting presence.

Soprano Louisa Tee, in colourful frock and sunglasses, is perkier than the usual saintly Micaela and even makes fun of her fiance’s devotion to his mother.

The soldiers’ roles are combined with those of the smugglers, so that Lawrence Olsworth- Peter’s gum-chewing Remendado and Tom Stoddart’s laid-back Dancairo are involved in a bit of smuggling when not square-bashing.

Julian Debreuil’s nervy Captain is wrong-footed by his men and by Carmen, with whom he has an on-off affair.

Emily-Jane Thomas and Melanie Sanders are delightfully ditzy as Carmen’s pals, and baritone Richard Immergluck is macho bull-fighter Escamillo.

SIR DAVID McVicar’s acclaimed production of The Abduction From The Seraglio arrived last week straight from the Festival’s Sussex home to the wide spaces of the Royal Albert Hall.

The queue for Arena tickets snaked round the building with opera-lovers eager to pay a mere £5 for the evening; top price at Glyndebourne is £225.

Mozart’s romantic comedy met the 18th century craze for tales of the Orient.

Konstanze and her English maid Blonde are sold by pirates to a Turkish Pasha.

A plan by their lovers Belmonte (Edgaras Montvidas) and his servant Pedrillo (Brenden Patrick Gunnell) to rescue them is thwarted by the Pasha’s henchman Osmin, and the fate of the four hangs on Pasha Selim’s judgment.

The story unfolds to one of Mozart’s most exquisite scores.

On and around the concert platform shared with the Orchestra Of The Age of Enlightenment under Music Director Robin Ticciati, the cast re-enacted their roles with all the energy of the Glyndebourne staged version.

The plate-throwing kitchen spat between Mari Eriksmoen’s Blonde and Tobias Kehrer’s Osmin even gained an extra spin.

As Konstanze, soprano Sally Matthews was in glorious voice, her bravura aria of defiance drawing prolonged applause.

How lucky we are to have the BBC Proms!

Bizet’s CARMEN
VERDICT: 4/5
Opera Up Close, Soho Theatre, London W1
(Tickets: 020 7478 0100/operaupclose.com; £15-£45)

Mozart’s THE ABDUCTION FROM THE SERAGLIO
VERDICT: 4/5
Prom 39 – BBC Proms
Glyndebourne Festival Opera/Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment Royal Albert Hall, London SW7 (Proms tickets: 0845 401 5040/bbc.co.uk/proms)

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