by In We Go, through the gaping pine of hell into an apocalypse of eternal damnation directly from medieval images. Nothing is pleasant in the staging of the Royal Opera IL Trovatore. This front curtain Höllenmund acts as a grim, weakly comic warning: Adele Thomas’ 2023 production for the first time (revival director Simon Iorio), reveals the Verdis opera in his entire anarchy in 1853. Naturalism, which is doubtful anyway with an action with dark curses and a mother who wrongly throws her baby on the fire. The violation fluctuates from the convention of set-piece choirs and magnificent farbar arias. In Annemarie Woods’ Designs, the Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch from the 15th century offers a test stone. No surprise to see people in animal skulls that balls and to this famous, harmoniously shiny melody, which we call the ambotherious gate (Coro di Zingari). Horny goblins plunge through trap doors and wind up and down the stairs, which, which are attached within three large frames, fill an otherwise empty stage. Choir and line -up (choreography by Emma Woods) must provide every detail of the story in a sharp focus.
On the first night, the dynamic was difficult to grasp at the beginning, the conductor Giacomo Sagripanti paused for applause, which may not have come automatically, and with some traps left in the ensemble between the stage and pit. As soon as Agnieszka Rehlis appeared when the vengeful agency accelerated the pace, the uncertainty hit. The Polish mezzo-soprano, fearless in urgency and despair, kept the Histrionics in narrow breeding (a contrast to Jamie Barton’s no-holds-born-draw in 2023, just as convincing, but different). Like Graf di Luna, the Russian baritone Aleksei Isaev, who sometimes overshadowed in ensembles, shone in his compassion in his large Aria “Il Balen”, in which Lunas threw love for the noble Leona. The American soprano Rachel Willis-Sørensen was extensive and insured when she was in love with the THE THE THE THE THE tax and emotional from Leonora, Manrico’s Troubadour Rebel. The star American tenor Michael Fabiano is characterized in this Italian repertoire, silky and passionate. Manrico’s battleship Aria “Di Quella Pira”, full of high risk, also had exciting, pulsating energy in the orchestra. His last duet with Azucena was lyrical and intense. This is brave and powerful theater, neither for performers nor for the audience. It lets you rattle: Verdi certainly wanted.
The most recent full-day total immersion of the BBC Symphony Orchestra is called Symphonic electronicswas an exploration of the music with old and new electronics with a look at a AI future. Since the greatest work, Tristan Murail’s “Spectral” Classic Classic Gondwana (1980) is for large orchestras without electronics, there is a challenge to sum up the porous boundaries of this extravagance. A British premiere by Steven Daverson (B 1985), Figures outside a Dacha with snowfall and a abbey in the backgroundUsed live electronics to give the filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky a homage.
I was ready to apologize to the friend I persuaded – but they loved the whole thing
DaVerson’s inspiration was the last recording of Tarkovsky’s film from 1983 nostalgiaThis shows a man, a dog, a pool, an abbey, then snow falls. It would not be true to say that this was immediately clear when listening, although the spatial effects of synthesized bells, sad brass and reinforced saxophone, guitar and other instruments generated an urgent, slowly moving avalanche of the sound. The other premiere, Bab-Khaneh: Gatehouse of Memorywas a BBC commission of the British-Iranian composer Shiva Feshareki (B 1987). His starting point was the Barbican itself: a tonal overview of the acoustics and the design of the building. At the same time, her piece required a complete reinvention of the natural sound of the hall by positioning an orchestra with loudspeaker words to create a 360-degree surround sound system.
She plays behind her turntable deck and plays the hall as an instrument: “Sculpting my spatial top -tables performance” at the moment. The BBC Symphony Orchestra mainly played persistent, slow notes, which may have tested her patience. Regardless of whether you react with a high volume on boulders of the sound in the hall, with a light design in wink colors, now like glowworms, now balls, now searches, a question of sensory resilience. I was ready to apologize to the friend that I persuaded – 50 minutes begins to feel epic, in every medium, even in Mahler – but they loved the whole thing. It certainly acts as a “web of memory”, as Feshareki intends. Songs flickered from the electro -acoustic buildings, impressive strokes of acoustic balm: from Purcell’s Dido and AeneasPaul McCartney and Wings’ My Love, Foreign 80s held a girl like her and the Iranian song Gole Sangam. Listen to the program in a future edition of Radio 3 New music show. A mono-smart spokesman may not have the same effect as the entire multi-channeled Barbican hall, but it is time to reduce your house to prepare.
To a small extent Crazy songwhich gave a entrepreneurial program in the Octobergalery: two premiere from Thomas Metcalf (B 1996) and Jean-Louis Agobet (B 1968) and two works of the 20th century, by Elliott Carter and Gérard Grisey. Metcalfs Photogenia In retrospect for a photographic process, which in the 1830s of William Henry Fox Talbot had pioneering work: delicate whir and tappings fade or grow like valley bots ghouettes on light -sensitive paper. To say that it left an impression is not intended as a clever pun: it did. These experienced young players deserve to reach a wider audience.
The 50th anniversary of the death of Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) is shown in late, as shown in the cycles of his 15 string quartets in Milton Court and Wigmore Hall near the parallel. In the second of the Jersual quartet‘S Wigmore series (you return in June), the group played the fourth, fifth and sixth quartets. Regardless of the two -time broken string of the cellist, these were brilliant detailed performance, at the same time acidic and melancholic. The ensemble, founded in 1993, is characterized by a resonance and volume to create a real bridge between the two violins and the cello. Ori Kam plays a modern instrument from the famous American manufacturer Hiroshi IIZUKA. Kam compared his reaction to put your foot on a Maserati. I wouldn’t know, but I’ve never heard anything like that.
Star reviews (from five)
IL Trovatore ★★★
Dive in total: Symphonic electronics ★★★
Crazy song ★★★★
Jerusalem quartet ★★★★
• IL Trovatore is in the Royal Opera House in London until July 19th
