Herodiade

Well, we have discovered an unexpected pleasure to start our week's holiday in August. We will be spending the last week in August exploring the pleasures of the Edington Festival of Music in the Liturgy, but on the Saturday we arrive Dorset Opera are performing Herodiade at Bryanston School in Blandford Forum, which is not a million miles from where we are staying.

Dorset Opera use professional soloists and orchestra but the back-stage crew and chorus are made up of volunteers, all of whom have undergone a 2 week summer-school to train them. They have a track record for doing interesting things and this year is no different, Massenet's pseudo-Biblical opera Herodiade with Rosalind Plowright in the title role, directed by William Relton.

It sounds like a grand start to the holiday and a remarkably contrast to the musical repertoire for the rest of the week.