A great evening of opera from ENO at the Coliseum, with an exceptional ensemble cast. This is a fine return for this production of Rigoletto from Jonathan Miller. Get a ticket!
The Turn of the Screw, English National Opera – Review
Benjamin Britten’s Opera, The Turn of the Screw – based on the novel by Henry James at ENO – There is plenty to enjoy about this production and it is worth seeing, but it didn’t create that existential feeling of unease in me or make the emotional connection that the music demands.
Suor Angelica – English National Opera
The team of star singers for this production of Suor Angelica at ENO was first-class with staging that made me eager to see a fully realised version.
Duke Bluebeard’s Castle – English National Opera
Bluebeard and his Zombie Brides Psychic dungeons, a lake of tears, weeping walls, and to cap it all an unexpected homo-erotic subtext, what’s not to love the ENO’s semi-staged performance of Béla Bartók’s one-act symbolist psychodrama Duke Bluebeard’s Castle. With a poetic libretto by Jewish-Hungarian writer Béla Balázs, the opera was composed in 1911 but […]
Jenůfa – English National Opera
Psychological Turmoil with a Powerful Ending David Alden’s production of Jenůfa, first shown at ENO in 2006 and revived in 2016 takes the work from its original village setting to a remote industrial estate at some point in the twentieth century, with Števa (John Findon) an Elvis like character complete with bleached blond hair, leather-jacket […]
The Magic Flute ENO
A magic Magic Flute Mozart’s Magic Flute should need no introduction. One of the most performed pieces of musical theatre, a piece so sacrosanct that fascist governments were scared to tamper with it. In The Queen Of the Night’s Der Hölle Rache it has the defining coloratura aria, written to show off Mozart’s sister-in-law’s high […]
Marina Abramovic’s “7 Deaths of Maria Callas” at the English National Opera
A Visual and Musical Feast at the ENO London is having a Marina Abramovic moment right now with her ‘opera project’ “7 Deaths of Maria Callas” opening at the ENO as well as a retrospective exhibition of her work at the Royal Academy (through to January 1st). If you are unfamiliar with Abramovic, it’s well […]
Iolanthe – English National Opera at the Coliseum
The Fairies Triumphant Return to the Coliseum The ENO are staging a revival of their 2018 hit production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Iolanthe. Director Cal McCrystal (Paddington 1 and 2, theatrical smash hit One Man, Two Guvnors. The ENO’s HMS Pinafore) is regarded as the go-to-director for comedy and as I didn’t catch it the […]
Blue – English National Opera – Review
Blue is the Colour “Is it an opera?” asked the venerable reviewer sitting to my left. Well, most emphatically yes. Composer Jeanine Tesori who has several Tony awards to her name and librettist Tazewell Thompson’s Blue, which opened last night at the ENO, is definitely an opera and why the question? Probably because Tesori’s CV […]
The Yeomen of the Guard at the ENO
Gilbert & Sullivan flourish at the Coliseum This is the ENO’s first production of The Yeoman of the Guard and it is brilliant that the ENO is able to take on more of the Gilbert & Sullivan repertoire as the home of British Opera. Yeoman is thought to be the opera duo’s finest musical work […]