Thomas Allen / Reviżjonijiet

Mozart Le nozze di Figaro, K492 – Opera buffa in four Acts to a libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte after the comedy La folle journée, ou Le mariage de Figaro, by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais [sung in Italian, with English surtitles] Figaro – Adam Maxey Susanna – Julieth Lozano Doctor Bartolo – Timothy Edlin Marcellina – Katy Thomson Cherubino – Lauren Joyanne Morris Don Basilio – Joel Williams Count Almaviva – Harry Thatcher Countess Almaviva – Sarah-Jane Brandon & Josephine Goddard Antonio – Conall O’Neill Don Curzio – Samuel Jenkins Barbarina – Poppy Shotts Bridesmaids – Camilla Harris & Jessica Cale Royal College of Music Opera Chorus & Orchestra Michael Rosewell Sir Thomas Allen – Director Lottie Higlett – Designer Rory Beaton – Lighting Kate Flatt – Choreographer Reviewed by: Peter Reed Reviewed: 26 November, 2018 Venue: Britten Theatre, Royal College of Music, London RCM's The Marriage of FigaroKaty Thomson, Joel Williams, Harry Thatcher, Adam Maxey, Sarah-Jane Brandon, Julieth LozanoPhotograph: Chris ChristodoulouWith good reason, Figaro and Susanna survey with horror the dump of a room they’ve been allocated by the Count for the start of married life. That is the first thing we see in Thomas Allen’s RCM staging of The Marriage of Figaro, and it sets the scene for a sparkling evening as well as neatly summing up the opera’s political idée fixe of rulers and the ruled. Allen has form as the Count, and his insider experience of Mozart and Da Ponte’s inexhaustible work works brilliantly for his cast. The traditional production has no overtly directorial points to make – except, perhaps, for a new-born infant in a crib in the Countess’s boudoir suggesting both that she is out of bounds for the sex-addicted Count and that she is suffering from post-natal depression – and, as part of the RCM’s opera course, it has been meticulously rehearsed. Everyone knows exactly what they are doing, their acting has that ring of confident spontaneity, and the wedding-dance sequence is a brilliantly choreographed and executed pleasure. Lottie Higlett’s elegant, rococo sets unfold smoothly from Figaro and Susanna’s squalid quarters, to the Countess’s boudoir, then adapting to a lovely garden setting for Act Four, and her costumes, particularly and not surprisingly those for Count and Countess, are very splendid. Higlett also clearly knows how to make it suit the scale of the Britten Theatre, and the whole look of her and Allen’s staging, besides complementing the singers and the story, is notably clear and refreshing. This is a generous, subtly observed production that would thrive in any opera house. And it has heart – relationships are tenderly drawn, there’s a big frisson of mutual desire when Cherubino serenades the vulnerable Countess that’s suddenly and fiercely moving, the Count’s collision of frustration and hard-headed authority is casually but lucidly defined, the machinations of the Marcellina-Bartolo-Basilio trio have the sort of slap-stick villainy that just evaporates when the truth of Figaro’s parentage emerges, and, the moment of truth, the Count’s ‘Contessa, perdona’ briefly makes time stand still. There are yet more boxes to tick in the quality of the singing. Adam Maxey has the vocal range for Figaro, the bass end of his baritone is pleasingly seductive, and, while he could do with more variety of tone, the moments when he takes charge (including an electrifying confrontation with the Count), suggest that the potential is all there. Maxey is also very tall, easily two heads taller than Julieth Lozano’s petite Susanna, which is rather sweet when they are together. Lozano’s soprano has a substantial middle range, and occasionally there is an absence of mischievous ping higher up. Her portrayal, though, lacks nothing in mischief or control, and, as might be expected from a servant constantly batting off the Count’s feudal rights, she has a far sharper awareness of her social status than does Figaro, who is interestingly ambivalent about the master-servant power axis – in another life, this Figaro might have made a good Jeeves, As it turns out, Susanna is a servant with two mistresses. Sarah-Jane Brandon’s Countess had been marvellous in Act Two, singing a ravishing ‘Porgi amor’, looking very stylish and up for all Cherubino’s attempts at seduction and cross-dressing larks. Then, before Act Three, it was announced that she was unwell and was being replaced by Josephine Goddard (the Countess in the alternative cast), who is just as good, and manages that trick of seeming aristocratically aloof from the trickery that she was playing on the Count. RCM's The Marriage of FigaroJulieth Lozano & Sarah-Jane BrandonPhotograph: Chris ChristodoulouHarry Thatcher’s Count is a triumph. He plays the Count’s complexities of motivation, the sudden shafts of empathy, his distraction and simpler personality traits such as a very short temper with astonishing directness, and he has a voice that expands on Mozart’s already magnificently characterful music with great passion and insight. Thatcher’s big Act Three sequence is outstanding, as is his handling of ‘Contessa perdono’. The fact that he has film-star looks is a help and he wears the costumes with the assurance that clinches his portrayal as a whole. Lauren Joyanne Morris’s light, even mezzo suits Cherubino’s two arias very well, and her acting reduces the she-as-he gap to near invisibility, an even match both for the Countess as for Poppy Shotts’s enchanting and very knowing Barbarina. Katy Thomson sings Marcellina with formidable strength and acts her frail hold on grande dame status with great and funny awareness, Timothy Edlin sings Bartolo’s ‘La vendetta’ with malicious glee, and you could only fantasise about how or why they managed to produce Figaro. The RCM Opera Orchestra left scorch marks with its virtuosic account of the Overture, and Michael Rosewell presides over an impressively responsive orchestra, which sports some equally refined woodwind-playing and acutely close ensemble. In the accompagnato passages, the musicians played with a continuo-like alertness, and throughout they were with Rosewell and the singers all the way. There are two more performances. This cast sings on November 28.

Luxury casting abounds as Thomas Allen returns as the harassed Music Master, Nikolay Borchev impresses as a priapic Harlequin and Karen Cargill's Exocet mezzo brings her brilliantly sung Dryad to the fore. Another mezzo, Ruxandra Donose, is dynamic as the hapless Composer. The high-lying passages may challenge her (like so many of Strauss's female roles it was intended for a soprano) but she sings her concentrated set pieces with idiomatic gusto and acts with practised ease as the proud creative artist who's beset by (understandable) mood swings. Jane Archibald has performed the flirtatious coloratura clown Zerbinetta far and wide, and her assurance in the character's big solo scena is now breathtaking. Show-stopping, jaw-dropping, the casual precision of Archibald's stratospheric brilliance has to be heard to be believed. All of these seemingly disparate parts are wrought into a seamless whole by the conducting of Lothar Koenigs in a distinguished Royal Opera debut. How sensitively he gauges the balance of Strauss's orchestrations! They're unusually light in this opera, but he supports the voices subtly: airy for Zerbinetta, full-blooded under Mattila's dramatic soprano and Smith's Heldentenor in the expansive, neo-Wagnerian finale. Five-star shows are hard to define - they're not necessarily about perfection - but you know when you've seen one. This is a shoo-in.

The Exterminating Angel is an international co-production, and Tom Cairns's staging scored a hit at last summer's Salzburg Festival. It arrives at the Royal Opera House garnered with critical plaudits and was greeted by the Covent Garden audience with wild approval, so I feel duty-bound to join in. Almost. The composer's orchestrations are undeniably bold and scintillating, and he has the knack of tempering musical challenge with approachability.Christine Rice as the pianist sings with exemplary clarity and expression, whereas Amanda Echalaz as the hostess makes one grateful there are surtitles.There's some above-the-stave virtuosity from Audrey Luna as a high-flying, high-lying opera singer. In places she sounds uncannily like the Ondes Martenot , the electronic instrument of warbling soundwaves that Cynthia Millar plays from one of the side boxe.What exactly is the Exterminating Angel? Adès describes it as an 'absence', although it makes more sense to see it as the thief of free will. We, like the sheep who safely graze as the audience enters, go astray and follow each other blindly towards annihilation. As a parable for our time, that's chilling.