Nevill Holt Festival announces five-year partnership with Opera North beginning with a co-production of Mozart's Cosi fan tutte

The 17th century stables at Nevill Holt which now house the theatre

Following a sharp pivot after the abbreviated 2023 opera season, the Nevill Holt Festival was inaugurated this year under the direction of James Dacre. Dacre brought an impressive offering together in a relatively short time including opera, classical music, jazz and contemporary music, alongside visual arts, talks and literature, including Melly Still's new production of Mozart's The Magic Flute, with Finnegan Downie Dear conducting Britten Sinfonia, Shadwell Opera premiering The Devil's Den by British-Canadian composer Isabella Gellis; Shadwell Opera's first full-length commission [see my interview].

The results have been impressive, 12,000 people attend more than 60 events during the 2024 festival, 75% of them for the first time and the festival will return in 2025 from 30 May - 22 June.

2025 will also see the inauguration of a new five-year partnership between the festival and Opera North, beginning with a new co-production of Mozart's Cosi fan tutte which will run in the theatre at Nevill Holt from 6-8 and 10-12 June. The partnership with Opera North will continue in future editions of the festival.

General Director, Opera North, Laura Canning commented, "This mutually beneficial partnership will give Opera North the opportunity to deliver great opera in a new context, while also enabling more learning and engagement activity to be developed in the area, reaching out to, and connecting with, the wider community. We look forward to working with the organisers to build on the success of an event which is rapidly becoming a major fixture in the UK arts calendar."

Further details from the Nevill Holt website.

A radical new look: full line-up for Nevill Holt's 2024 festival

The full line-up for the radical new 2024 Nevill Holt Festival has now been announced. Running from 1 to 26 June 2024, guest festival director James Dacre's programme features opera, classical music, jazz and contemporary, alongside visual arts, talks and literature.

This is a very different style of festival to previously, instead of two main operas there is a wide mix of events intended to tempt people into repeat visits. Also, the wider estate is more involved with an outdoor art exhibition, come for a concert and stay for Anthony Caro's sculpture.

The musical events place quite a reliance on established artists and I miss a young artists strand, though casting for the opera has not yet been announced.

Opera remains a strong strand in the festival, there will be six performances of Melly Still's new production of Mozart's The Magic Flute, with Finnegan Downie Dear conducting Britten Sinfonia. And Finnegan Downie Dear returns with Shadwell Opera, of which he is music director, for the premiere performance of The Devil's Den by British-Canadian composer Isabella Gellis. The opera is Shadwell Opera's first full-length commission and we are promised a tale of superstition and sacrifice rooted in English folklore, concerning a child, a rabbit, a devil, a druid and their mysterious connection to a celebrated dolmen.

Britten Sinfonia will also be giving a concert featuring music by Benjamin Kwasi-Burrell and Sergey Akhunov, plus Max Richter's version of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons, accompanied by David Yarrow photography. There are recitals from pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, tenor Nicky Spence, soprano Mary Bevan & pianist Joseph Middleton, mezzo-soprano Sarah Connolly & pianist Imogen Cooper, and pianists Pavel Kolesnikov & Samson Tsoy (including Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring).

Alexis Ffrench will be performing music from his latest album, Michael Morpurgo will be reading passages from his novel War Horse with musical accompaniment from Ben Murray, Anton Lesser will read excerpts from Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall with music by Debbie Wiseman played by Katherine Rockhill. Cécile McLorin Salvant and pianist Dan Tepfer will be performing French chanson and there is more French chanson from Jessica Walker and Joseph Atkins

Jazz performers include Jalen Ngonda, and Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Orchestra, music director Pete Long, with Liane Carroll. 

Throughout the festival there will be a display of sculpture by Anthony Caro across the Nevill Holt estate alongside an outdoor sculpture collection including work by Antony Gormley, Rachel Whiteread, Allen Jones, Conrad Shawcross, Marc Quinn and Sean Henry. There will be a screening of Vinny Rawding and Lee Cogswell's BOTY, and there will be conversations with sculptor Andy Goldsworthy, photographer David Yarrow, artist Chila Kumari Singh Burman, sculptor Nic Fiddian-Green and artist Allen Jones. Talks include Simon Martin on British Pop Art, and Daniel Hermann on the work of Eduardo Paolozzi.

On 14 and 15 June there is an extensive programme of conversations and talks, along with a free, hands-on archaeological exhibition for families based on objects found in the local area with University of Leicester Archaeological Services. For families there is also Madame Chandelier’s Opera Party for Kids which celebrates opera’s greatest hits in an interactive format. 

Over 1,500 primary schoolchildren will create 50-minute versions of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel which will be performed across the region in partnership with the Royal Opera House. One of these productions will play during the festival, accompanied by sopranos Fiona Finsbury and Eleanor Sanderson-Nash, directed by Jonathan Ainscough and conducted by Simon Toyne.

Full details from the festival website.

Nevill Holt refocuses as a multi-arts festival for 2024 under guest festival director James Dacre.

Plans have been announced for the 2024 festival at Nevill Holt with Nevill Holt Opera being refocused as the Nevill Holt Festival. Whilst music and the arts have always been a feature of the present incarnation of the Nevill Holt estate (bought and restored by David Ross in 2000 following years as a prep school), the performance presentation has undergone a number of incarnations. 

Initially a temporary theatre was created in the courtyard of the historic 17th century stables and opera seasons presented in collaboration with Wasfi Kani's Grange Park Opera. Then in 2013, a new company was launched, Nevill Holt Opera, with director Oliver Mears and conductor Nicholas Chalmers. In 2018 the temporary theatre was replaced by an award winning new one by architects Witherford Watson Mann and then in 2021 the festival was held in the open air [see my review of Mozart's Don Giovanni]. This year's festival had something of a wobble as plans were radically altered and one opera programme cancelled after booking had opened.

Now plans have been announced for moving to a multi-arts festival. The Nevill Holt Festival in 2024 is being curated by guest festival director James Dacre, artistic director of Northampton's Royal & Derngate Theatres from 2013-2023. 

There will be a festival opera, Mozart's The Magic Flute [ironically, or deliberately, the first production from Nevill Holt Opera in 2013] created in association with the Britten Sinfonia. Other musical events include performances from mezzo-soprano Sarah Connolly and pianist Imogen Cooper, pianists Jeneba Kanneh-Mason, Benjamin Grosvenor, Pavel Kolesnikov & Samson Tsoy. Tenor Nicky Spence, soprano Mary Bevan and pianist Joseph Middleton bring their celebratory Noel Coward programme, the Britten Sinfonia will perform Max Richter's Vivaldi re-write alongside a world premiere, and Cécile McLorin Salvant and Dan Tepfer will premiere A French Affair as an evening of chansons exploring their shared French heritage. 

In the wider arts, there will be an Anthony Caro exhibition across the Nevill Holt estate alongside an outdoor sculpture collection including work by Antony Gormley, Rachel Whiteread, Allen Jones, Conrad Shawcross, Marc Quinn and Sean Henry. Other events include comedian Mark Watson, Michael Morpurgo, and Alice Roberts.

Over 1,500 primary schoolchildren will perform a 50-minute version of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel in theatres across the region with sopranos Fiona Finsbury and Eleanor Sanderson-Nash, directed by Jonathan Ainscough and conducted by Simon Toyne. Their final performance will fall during Nevill Holt Festival 2024. Meanwhile, the music scholars of Northampton’s Malcolm Arnold Academy will present a chamber music concert in the atmospheric surroundings of the Chapel, accompanied by Jem Lowther and Jamie Milburn and the Big Band of Malcolm Arnold Academy will be led by jazz artist Jamie Glew-Osborn in a programme of jazz standards and big band classics.

Full details from the Nevill Holt Festival website.

An afternoon delight: Anna Morrisey's inventive production of Rossini's The Barber of Seville at Nevill Holt Opera, in a finely musical performance conducted by Dinis Sousa

Rossini: The Barber of Seville - end of Act One - Nevill Holt Opera 2022 (Photo Genevieve Girling)

Rossini: The Barber of Seville; Liam Bonthrone, Michel de Souza, Sarah Champion, Grant Doyle, Andri Björn Róbertsson, Janis Kelly, director: Anna Morrissey, Royal Northern Sinfonia, conductor Dinis Sousa; Nevill Holt Opera
Reviewed 26 June 2022 (★★★★)

Anarchic, inventive yet well-observed production of Rossini's comic opera, in a crisply engaging musical performance

For its Summer season this year, Nevill Holt Opera is back in its regular theatre, the lovely modern space inserted into Nevill Holt's historic stables. The first opera of the season was Puccini's La boheme, and on Sunday 26 June 2022, we caught Anna Morrissey's production of Rossini's The Barber of Seville. Dinis Sousa conducted the Royal Northern Sinfonia, with Liam Bonthrone as Almaviva, Michel de Souza as Figaro, Sarah Champion as Rosina, Grant Doyle as Dr Bartolo, Andri Björn Róbertsson as Don Basilio  and Janis Kelly as Berta. Peter Davies played the fortepiano continuo. Designs were by Alex Berry, with lighting by Jamie Platt.

Morrissey's production was modern dress with Berry's set designs being a symphony of pink (surely an ironic gesture given Bartolo was a surly curmudgeon). There was a strong 1980s feel about everything, perhaps as a genuine setting but possibly to suggest that Dr Bartolo was rather stuck in a time-warp, certainly Grant Doyle's Bartolo with his beard, greasy long hair and dodgy suit seemed somewhat stuck in an image of his youth. As with many modern performances, the production was less about Count Almaviva's disguising himself to his his elevated status and more about the attempts to release Sarah Champion's Rosina from her prison. Shorn of its historic, Iberian context, Bartolo's immuring of his ward seems even more arbitrary and cruel, and this inevitably skews the perception of this plot. Every generation re-interprets the classics, and different perceptions come and go. What counted here was not so much the dramaturgy as Morrissey's very inventive approach to the production.

Rossini: The Barber of Seville - Sarah Champion, Michel de Souza, Liam Bonthrone - Nevill Holt Opera 2022 (Photo Genevieve Girling)

Folk ritual and drama: Mozart's Don Giovanni at Nevill Holt Opera rises to the challenge

Mozart: Don Giovanni - Roman Ackley - Nevill Holt Opera(photo Lloyd Winters)

Mozart Don Giovanni; Seán Boylan, Nicholas Crawley, Anna Patalong, Aoife Miskelly, Joshua Owen Mills, Olivia Warburton, Benedict Nelson, dir: Jack Furness, Shadwell:Ensemble, cond: Finnegan Downie Dear; Nevill Holt Opera
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 22 August 2021 Star rating: 4.5 (★★★★½)
A profoundly satisfying production, using disturbing English folk-ritual alongside some vividly theatrical elements

Mozart's Don Giovanni is an opera which takes place in an urban landscape, much of it at night, so setting the piece outdoors in the middle of the afternoon might seem something of a stretch. But for their production of Mozart's Don Giovanni (seen Sunday 22 August 2021), Nevill Holt Opera and director Jack Furness have risen to the challenge. Conducted by Finnegan Downie Dear and with the new Shadwell:Ensemble, the production featured Seán Boylan as Don Giovanni, Nicholas Crawley as Leporello, Anna Patalong as Donna Anna, Aoife Miskelly as Donna Elvira, Joshua Owen Mills as Don Ottavio, Olivia Warburton as Zerlina and Benedict Nelson as Masetto. Designs were by Alex Berry, movement by Jenny Ogilvie and the sound design by Mark Rogers.

The opera was performed in Mozart's Vienna version, though without the cuts to the Act Two finale which Mozart made in Vienna, and the costumes were 17th century, a decision which at a stroke gives very clear visual definition to the class hierarchy which is so important in the opera.

Mozart: Don Giovanni - Nevill Holt Opera (photo Lloyd Winters)

When I chatted to Jack Furness earlier this year [see my interview], he talked about his feeling that 'there is a tendency when working on an opera to think of the job as like writing an essay, to make a cogent argument about the piece', and how he wanted to 'create a space on stage where people can tell a story, to create insight'. Furness and Berry's approach to Don Giovanni might seem counter-intuitive at first, but it succeeded brilliantly in doing just what Furness had been talking about.

The 17th century setting was placed within the context of the wedding rituals for Zerlina (Olivia Warburton) and Masetto (Benedict Nelson), with Furness, Berry and movement director Jenny Ogilvie utilising the wonderfully disturbing element that can be found in English folk ritual. These happened on and off stage, so that during the early part of Act One, we could see Warburton, Nelson and the chorus in the area between the theatre and the stable block. Furness used the chorus movements as a commentary during the scenes with the aristocratic cast, often seemingly providing a strange and threatening backdrop. This was brilliantly demonstrated in the Act One finale, where the space meant that Ogilvie and Furness really had the ability to create three very different dances, the aristocrats and two different round-dances for the 'lesser folk', yet at the end this turned threatening as the chorus put their masks back and faced Boylan's Don Giovanni en masse, suddenly threatening and strange. 

For Act Two, the folk rituals took a back seat whilst never quite disappearing, until the finale when Furness thrillingly used the idea of the burning man to creative effect. And in Act Two, the rules started to be broken, boundaries blurred. We saw elements of the mechanics behind the 'opera production', hints of modernity, of stage-hands, of the fact that the people in the opera were we just actors in wigs. Yet Furness took the story quite seriously, the production thankfully lacked any of the irony which modern directors often bring to the work's dénouement. Here we really did have a statue that came alive (Dingle Yandell in brilliant form). What there was however, was wit and fun. The production mixed the funny and the serious in fine manner. The result was one of the most satisfying productions of Don Giovanni that I have seen in a long time, lacking any annoying directorial pensées and creative rewriting of the plot.

It helped that we had a finely balanced young cast who each created strongly etched characters.

Nevill Holt Opera gives us a vividly theatrical but musically strong account of Verdi's La Traviata in its new outdoor theatre

Verdi: La traviata - Annabel Kennedy and NHO Chorus - Nevill Holt Opera (Photo Lloyd Winters)

Verdi La Traviata; Susana Gaspar, Luis Gomes, Michel de Souza, dir: Jamie Manton, Manchester Camerata, cond: Nicholas Chalmers; Nevill Holt Opera
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 6 August 2021 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
A performance which vividly filled the outdoor auditorium without sacrificing the intimacy of Verdi's opera, allied to a strongly musical performance

Nevill Holt Opera planned to perform Verdi's La traviata and Mozart's Don Giovanni in their award-winning new theatre (which opened in 2018) for the 2020 season. 2021 sees the company finally performing these operas but not in the theatre which is built into the court-yard of Nevill Holt Hall's historic stable block, but in a temporary outdoor space which has enabled the company to perform safely to large audiences. The temporary theatre places the orchestra under cover, with the audience in stands surrounding the central acting area. Some audience areas are covered, some not and there is an area for those happy to sit on the ground. The theatre's increase in capacity (over 600 as opposed to the main theatre's 400) has meant that the company has been able to offer affordable ticket prices with free seats to the under 18s. Like many groups that have had to use imagination when it came to continuing to work during the pandemic, you feel that the discoveries made by the company during this season will have an impact on future seasons.

Perhaps Verdi's La traviata would not be the ideal choice of opera for performance outdoors in what was effectively a small stadium, but Jamie Manton's production for Nevill Holt Opera (which we caught on 10 August 2021) brilliantly energised the whole acting area without ever losing the opera's intimate focus on the leading character. Susana Gaspar was Violetta with Luis Gomes as Alfredo and Michel de Souza as Giorgo Germont, plus Philippa Boyle as Annina and Annabel Kennedy as Flora. Nicholas Chalmers (artistic director of Nevill Holt Opera) conducted the Manchester Camerata. Designs were by Camilla Clarke with movement by Clara Bajado.

Verdi: La traviata - Luis Gomes, Susana Gaspar - Nevill Holt Opera (Photo Lloyd Winters)

The central acting area, raised and covered in grass, featured a large structure which was part bar, part fountain, part podium. This was where Susana Gaspar's Violetta greeted her guests at the opera's opening and this was where she and Luis Gomes' Alfredo reunited at the end of the opera. Manton, with movement director Clara Bajado, used the ensemble to people the stage filling the space with movement which complemented the action without pulling focus, and we had spectators for Violetta's Act One finale and for her death. This Violetta very much lived her life in public, and show was essential to her nature; Gaspar sported a series of remarkable candyfloss coloured wigs and only at a couple of key moments did we see her with her natural, dark-coloured hair.

Nevill Holt Opera plans for its biggest and most ambitious festival to date with a new open-air performance space

Artist Impression of potentia -designs for Nevill Holt Opera 2021

Whilst the exact nature of live performance this Summer is still unclear, at minumum there is almost certain to be an element of social distancing. This means that smaller companies have to make some hard decisions, how to afford an opera season when the audience is a fraction of normal. Nevill Holt Opera has taken the brave and enterprising decision to create an entirely new performance space for 2021. 

This year the festival is being moved to August and will be performed outside, on a new outdoor stage and seating which will allow an audience of 650 people, socially distanced, per performance as well safe distancing for the performers. The orchestra will be on a large covered stage, with performers on a fore-stage which means that the audience will be closer to the performance. In a gesture which echoes the open rear of the stage at Santa Fe Opera (with its spectacular views of Arizona), the Nevill Holt stage will be open to frame views of the Leicestershire countryside.

Update: Cast and creatives have now been announced for the two productions. For La Traviata, Nicholas Chalmers will conduct the Manchester Camerata with Susana Gaspar as Violetta, Luis Gomes as Alfredo and Michel de Souza as Germont (all three formed Jette Parker Young Artists), directed by Jamie Manton. Don Giovanni features a team from Shadwell Opera, Finnegan Downie Dear (Shadwell Opera's music director) will conduct Shadwell:Ensemble, and Jack Furness (Shadwell Opera's artistic director) will direct, with a cast including Seán Boylan as Don Giovanni, Nicholas Crawley as Leporello, Aoife Miskelly as Donna Elvira, Olivia Warburton as Zerlina, Joshua Owen Mills as Don Ottavio, and Dingle Yandell as the Commendatore.

Nicholas Chalmers, Artistic Director of Nevill Holt Opera, comments, "Nevill Holt Opera 2021 is to be our biggest and most ambitious festival to date.  We invite you to come and immerse yourselves in the world of Mozart and Verdi in a beautiful outdoor staging.  ... We are responding to the events of the last year by opening up the festival to a larger audience, sharing our high artistic standards and doing everything we can to make your experience entertaining and uplifting.  We are all missing the arts and I personally cannot wait to conduct Verdi’s masterpiece, La traviata."

There are new productions of Verdi's La traviata and Mozart's Don Giovanni running from 4 August to 25 August 2021. Ticket prices are designed to be affordable, with prices from £35 and free for under-18s. In addition, the company is planning to present further performances and a mini festival in June, to include chamber music and solo recitals in the theatre, as well as additional performances in August.

1920's era silent films forms the inspiration for Adele Thomas' production of Mozart's Cosi fan tutte in the stylish new theatre at Nevill Holt Opera

Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro - Nick Pritchard, Martin Hassler, Carolina Lippo, John Molloy, Alexandra Lowe, Katie Coventry - Nevill Holt Opera 2019 (Photo Ellie Kurtz)

Mozart Cosi fan tutte; Alexandra Lowe, Katie Coventry, Nick Pritchard, Martin Hässler, John Molloy, Carolina Lippa, dir: Adele Thomas, Royal Northern Sinfonia, cond: Nicholas Chalmers; Nevill Holt Opera
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 30 June 2019 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
Flappers & silent films form the backdrop of Adele Thomas' production, presented in the elegantly sympathetic new theatre at Nevill Holt

Nevill Holt Opera (artistic director Nicholas Chalmers) has been going since 2013, operating at first in a temporary theatre inserted into the courtyard of the 17th century stables at Nevill Holt House. In 2018 this theatre was replaced by a permanent structure, a handsome wooden theatre constructed within the stable courtyard. It is a satisfyingly elegant solution to the problem of creating a modern theatre in an historic building. So it was with much interest that we made our first visit to the theatre on Sunday 30 June 2019.

Having opened its 2019 season of Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Nevill Holt Opera continued the season with Adele Thomas' production of Mozart' s Cosi fan tutte (originally seen at Northern Ireland Opera). Nicholas Chalmers conducted the Royal Northern Sinfonia, with Alexandra Lowe as Fiordiligi, Katie Coventry as Dorabella, Nick Pritchard as Ferrando, Martin Hässler as Gulglielmo, Carolina Lippo as Dorabella, and John Molloy as Don Alfonso. Designs were by Hannah Clark with lighting by Kevin Treacy, Emma Woods was associate director and choreographer.

Different generations have seen Cosi fan tutte as problematic in different ways, being regarded as risque, vulgar or immoral in the 19th and early 20th century it only came back into the operatic canon after the Second World War, but contemporary directors see problems because of the work's implicit misogyny and the way the ending artlessly reverts to the status quo. Over the years I have seen a number of solutions to these apparent problems, whether it be having the women see through the men's disguises, having the women use doubles at the final wedding, or simply ending in emotional confusion. Adele Thomas set the work in America of the 1920s, pitting the experience of Don Alfonso and Despina against the innocence of the lovers.

But she chose to filter the whole thing through the films of the silent comedy era, with the result that for much of Act One it was difficult to be certain whether we were seeing real people and real emotions, or simply pretend. The singers entered into the concept with a will, and Hannah Clark's stylish designs contributed enormously, but there was a distancing effect which blunted the humanity and emotions of Mozart and Da Ponte's characters. Fiordiligi's 'Come scoglio' should come as a powerful statement that this is far more than a skittish comedy, yet here Thomas' staging emphasised style and stylisation over emotion. And there was the hint that perhaps she was concerned to provide the audience with an element of visual entertainment during what is a long aria.