On Saturday we went to see Cherubini's Medee given by Chelsea Opera Group. This year is the 250th anniversary of Cherubini's birth but people do not seem to be beating a path to his door. It is disappointing that no opera companies seem to be planning a full staging of this opera. The last time we saw it in London was, I think, the 1989 production at Covent Garden with Rosalind Plowright on good form but in a very poorly conceived production. Having heard Yvonne Howard's assumption of the title role for COG, we are just crying out for someone to snap her up and stage the work, Grange Park, Opera Holland Park, English Touring Opera, anyone?
Having been taken with the opera all over again I went looking for a recording. There only seems to be one solitary recording of the piece in French, on Newport Classics with Phyllis Treigle in the title role, released in 1997. And this does not seem to have made it into The Gramophone so I have no idea what it is like. There is also a live recording with Iano Tamar which evidently has rather poor sound.
So not only do we want a production, but we need a decent recording from a period band as well!
This neglect is perhaps not so surprising. Carmen apart, opera companies seem nervous of doing operas which require lots of French dialogue, even in France! Adrian Noble's new production of Carmen at the Opera Comique trimmed the dialogue down to the bone. And when we saw Medee at the Chatelet a few years ago, in a production from Toulouse, it was performed in Italian with the recitatives!
Monday 22 November 2010
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Popular Posts this month
-
Septura I first became aware of the brass septet, Septura , when noting their 2017/18 concert series Kleptomania at St John's Smith...
-
Britten: Death in Venice - Tim Mead, Leo Dixon - Royal Opera ((c) ROH 2019 photographed by Catherine Ashmore) 2019 seems to have b...
-
Mural: chamber music by Gabriel Vicéns; Stradivarius Reviewed 15 April 2024 At times fierce and concentrated, Gabriel Vicéns music can evok...
-
National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, Jessica Cottis Catalyst : Coleridge-Taylor, Julius Eastman, Gavin Higgins, Dani Howard, Prokofiev...
-
Thomas Elwin as Lensky in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin at West Green House Opera in 2021(Photo: Matthew Williams-Ellis) West Green House...
-
Ben Goldscheider Jörg Widmann, Beethoven, Schumann, Huw Watkins, York Bowen; Ben Goldscheider, Richard Uttley; Wigmore Hall Reviewed 17 Marc...
-
Bizet: Carmen, Act One - Blaise Malaba, Aighul Akhmetshina - Royal Opera House (Photo: ROH/Camilla Greenwell) Bizet: Carmen ; Aigul Akhmets...
-
Gimnazija Kranj Symphony Orchestra I get all sorts of mail, people sending my information on concerts and recordings. Everything gets gl...
-
Mozart: Don Giovanni - Hurn Court Opera (Photo: Patrick Frost, BlackStar Pictures) Mozart: Don Giovanni : Sam Young, Samuel Lom, Lizzie Ryde...
-
Leeds Lieder Young Artists 2024 at Howard Assembly Room Composers & Poets Forum Showcase: A Leeds Songbook; Leeds Lieder Festival at Le...
No comments:
Post a Comment