2014 – 2015 La traviata Verdi
The Coronation of Poppea
Monteverdi
The Bartered Bride Smetana
The Marriage of Figaro
Mozart
La vida breve De Falla
Gianni Schicchi Puccini
Carousel
Rodgers & Hammerstein
The Flying Dutchman Wagner
Welcome Richard Mantle General Director
Opening up a broad range of artistic experiences to people of all tastes, backgrounds and ages has been a vital part of Opera North’s mission since its inception. Indeed, one of the most remarkable aspects of opera is the diversity of musical and theatrical experiences it encompasses – after all, its history spans 400 years and now, at the beginning of the 21st century, it thrives on every continent of the world. Our 2014/15 season includes masterpieces from each of the last four centuries, many of them in new productions that are brought to the stage by some of today’s leading creative artists and strong British and international casts. Works such as Verdi’s La traviata, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Smetana’s The Bartered Bride have provided countless people with cherished first experiences of opera, and I am certain that they will do so again in the year ahead. For those who know and love them well already, these works are endlessly rewarding, especially when given fresh interpretations, and I am delighted that we are able to bring you brand new productions of both Traviata and Figaro for the first time in 15 years or more. Also new is our first ever production of one of opera’s earliest masterpieces, Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea, the musical and dramatic power of which remains undiminished almost four centuries after it was created.
We have carefully balanced drama with comedy throughout the year – in one instance, in two works on the same evening. Puccini’s is not a name readily associated with comedy, but his one-act Gianni Schicchi is a delightful exception to the norm. Taking inspiration from our Eight Little Greats season of short operas in 2004, we have given Schicchi a somewhat unexpected companion piece in Manuel de Falla’s La vida breve, which was itself a memorable highlight of the Eight Little Greats season. Rodgers & Hammerstein created several of the greatest works of music theatre of the 20th century – worthy successors to the European operetta tradition out of which the Golden Age of the American musical emerged. Our 2012 production Carousel did full justice to every aspect of this masterpiece, not least its superb score. It was acclaimed in Leeds, where it opened, and subsequently at the Barbican in London and the Châtelet in Paris, and I am proud that it rejoins our repertoire this year. To complete the season we turn to Wagner, as we have in each of the past few summers. As with our enormously successful Ring performances, we will be presenting The Flying Dutchman in a special concert staging with an exceptional cast conducted by the Company’s Music Director Richard Farnes. However different their styles may be, each of the composers represented in the 2014/15 season lavished some of the best music ever written on their works for the stage. We look forward to welcoming you to what I am sure will be many outstanding experiences in the year ahead.
Giuseppe Verdi 1853 New production
La traviata
Cast includes: Violetta Valéry
Hye-Youn Lee (Sep–Nov) / Anna Jeruc-Kopec (Jan–Mar) Alfredo Germont Ji-Min Park Giorgio Germont
Roland Wood (Sep–Nov) / Stephen Gadd (Jan–Mar) Flora Bervoix Victoria Sharp Gastone Daniel Norman Baron Douphol Peter Savidge Marquis d’Obigny
Nicholas Butterfield Doctor Grenvil Dean Robinson
Violetta is a courtesan who is enjoying the Parisian high-life when, to her surprise, she falls in love. But she cannot escape the consequences of her past life, and circumstances conspire to force her to sacrifice what may be her only chance of real love. Asked some years after its premiere which of his operas he liked best, Verdi replied ‘Speaking as a professional, Rigoletto; as an amateur La traviata’. He poured some of his most heartfelt music into this intimate story of family tensions and blighted love, and the result is one of opera’s most profoundly moving masterpieces.
Annina Louise Collett Conductor
Gianluca Marcianò (Sep–Nov) / Oliver von Dohnányi (Jan – Mar) Director Alessandro Talevi Set and Costume Designer
Madeleine Boyd Lighting Designer Matthew Haskins Video Designer Gemma Burrdit
Lasts approximately 2 hours 45 mins Sung in Italian with English titles
Director Alessandro Talevi and designer Madeleine Boyd (The Turn of the Screw, Don Giovanni) set Opera North’s first new production of La traviata for 15 years in Belle Époque Paris. Two South Korean artists with burgeoning international careers, the soprano Hye-Youn Lee and the tenor Ji-Min Park, are Violetta and Alfredo in the autumn season, with the Polish soprano Anna Jeruc-Kopec singing Violetta in the winter.
Claudio Monteverdi 1643
Cast includes: Poppea Sandra Piques Eddy Nerone James Laing Ottavia Catherine Hopper Seneca James Creswell Ottone Christopher Ainslie Drusilla Katherine Manley Arnalta Fiona Kimm Fortuna / Valletto Ciara Hendrick Virtù Claire Pascoe
New production
The Coronation of Poppea Based loosely on actual events in 1st-century AD Rome, The Coronation of Poppea charts the consuming erotic obsession of the Emperor Nero for the beautiful Poppea Sabina. Ruthlessly sweeping aside anyone who stands in the way of their union – including Nero’s wife Octavia and the poet and philosopher Seneca – Nero and Poppea triumph over all their opponents and rejoice in one of the most sexually-charged love duets ever written.
Amore Emilie Renard Liberto Daniel Norman Lucano Nicholas Sharratt Conductor Laurence Cummings Director Tim Albery Set and Costume Designer
Hannah Clark Lighting Designer Malcolm Rippeth
The moral ambivalence of one of opera’s earliest masterpieces ensures that it remains to this day one of the most shocking and compelling. Tim Albery, who directed a ravishing production of Handel’s Giulio Cesare for Opera North in 2012, has prepared a new performing version of a dramma musicale about which almost everything is disputed, including its authorship.
English translation Tim Albery
Lasts approximately 3 hours Sung in English Supported by the
Friends of Opera North Supported by a generous gift from
Terry and Liz Bramall
A cast of superb singer-actors is led by the American mezzo-soprano Sandra Piques Eddy (Poppea) and the British counter-tenor James Laing (Nerone). The conductor is Laurence Cummings, one of Britain’s most exciting and versatile exponents of historically-informed performance.
Bedrich Smetana 1866
Revival of 1998 production
The Bartered Bride
Mařenka and Jeník are in love, but her father wants her to marry the son of the wealthiest man in town. In the end, youth and cunning outsmart age and power, and the constraints of rural life are thrown off for a while when the circus comes to town.
Cast includes: Mařenka Kate Valentine Jeník Brenden Gunnell Vašek Nicholas Watts Kecal James Creswell Krušina Peter Savidge Ludmila Ann Taylor
Smetana is best known for his symphonic poem Ma Vlast (My Country). His music for The Bartered Bride abounds with freshness and vitality, its energy generated by bold contrasts of mood and atmosphere, the exuberance of its folk-like rhythms and the catchiness of its tunes.
Tobias Micha Stephen Richardson Háta Fiona Kimm Esmeralda Jennifer France Conductor Anthony Kraus
James Holmes (31 Oct, 18 Nov) Director Daniel Slater Set and Costume Designer
Daniel Slater’s colourful production has been enthusiastically received by both audiences and critics:
‘If you want to introduce someone to the delights of opera, this is the one to take them to.’ Sunday Telegraph, 1998
Robert Innes Hopkins Lighting Designer Simon Mills Choreographer Vanessa Gray Revival Choreographer
Tim Claydon English translation
Leonard Hancock and David Pountney Lasts approximately 2 hours 45 mins Sung in English with English titles
‘Daniel Slater’s updating of Smetana’s sentimental comedy first appeared in 1998 and is one for all the family, with its all-dancing verve and second-half circus interlude, which gets the evening’s biggest cheer.’ The Times, 2004
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart 1786
Cast includes: Figaro Richard Burkhard Susanna Silvia Moi Count Almaviva Quirijn de Lang Countess Almaviva
Ana Maria Labin Cherubino Helen Sherman Doctor Bartolo Henry Waddington
Dean Robinson (11, 17, 21, 27 Feb; 5, 7 Mar)
New production
The Marriage of Figaro It’s Figaro’s wedding day, and, to add to the usual worries, Figaro learns that his master, the Count, is out to bed his bride-to-be Susanna. The Countess is heartbroken by her husband’s faithlessness – but she is the object of the adolescent desires of the page, Cherubino. And Figaro is in trouble with the housekeeper, Marcellina, who has lent him money on the promise that, if he can’t repay her, he’ll have to marry her…
Don Basilio Joseph Shovelton Marcellina Gaynor Keeble Barbarina Ellie Laugharne Conductor Alexander Shelley
Anthony Kraus (14, 26, 28 Mar) Director Jo Davies Set Designer Leslie Travers
The Marriage of Figaro is aptly subtitled ‘The Follies of a Day’. Mozart’s music bubbles along with comedic high spirits, but it plumbs the depths of emotion, too, expressing the joy and pain of love and the agony and ecstasy of desire, until all is resolved in a spirit of forgiveness.
Costume Designer Gabrielle Dalton Lighting Designer James Farncombe English translation Jeremy Sams
Lasts approximately 3 hours Sung in English
With recent work for Opera North including a deliciously funny Ruddigore and a heart-rending Carousel, director Jo Davies is perfectly placed to hold the effervescent comedy and the serious heart of Mozart’s sublime masterpiece in ideal balance.
Manuel de Falla 1913 Revival of 2004 production
La vida breve
Cast includes: Salud Anne-Sophie Duprels La abuela Elizabeth Sikora Carmela Beth Mackay Paco Jesús Álvarez Manuel Gavan Ring
From the composer of the orchestral showpiece Nights in the Gardens of Spain and the popular ballet The Three-Cornered Hat comes this irresistibly exuberant opera that sets violently passionate emotions amid the colourful sights and sounds of Granada.
Uncle Salvador Graeme Broadbent Singer Quirijn de Lang Off-stage Voice Daniel Norman Conductor Jac van Steen /
Martin Pickard (24 Mar) Director Christopher Alden Set Designer Johan Engels Costume Designer Sue Willmington
La vida breve is an all or nothing tragedy of a woman who loves too much a worthless man who strings her along, knowing all the while that he is to marry another girl. The atmosphere is heavy with fatalism, heightened by the influence of Andalusian folk song, lightened by Spanish dance rhythms, and the action is ferociously intense.
Lighting Designer Adam Silverman
Lasts approximately 1 hours 15 mins Sung in Spanish with English titles Performed in a double bill with Gianni Schicchi
Christopher Alden’s production was one of the highlights of Opera North’s groundbreaking, award-winning Eight Little Greats season in 2004, and was extravagantly praised by Germaine Greer on BBC2’s Newsnight Review: ‘It’s a staggering work and it was staggeringly presented and performed. If you see nothing else this year, and you give a damn, see La vida breve. Go to Salford, Nottingham, go wherever you can and see it.’
Giacomo Puccini 1918
Cast includes: Gianni Schicchi Christopher Purves Lauretta Jennifer France Rinuccio Jesús Álvarez Zita Elizabeth Sikora Gheraldo Daniel Norman Marco Peter Savidge Simone Graeme Broadbent
New production
Gianni Schicchi After the dark, suicidal angst of La vida breve, Gianni Schicchi is the perfect companion piece – a satyr play played out around the death-bed of a rich man. The scheming relatives who vie for a chunk of his fortune are all too recognizable types, revealing the greed and avarice which lie just below the thin veneer of their family loyalties.
Nella Victoria Sharp Conductor Jac van Steen /
Martin Pickard (24 Mar) Director Christopher Alden Set Designer Charles Edwards Costume Designer Doey Luethi Lighting Designer Adam Silverman
Lasts approximately 1 hour Sung in Italian with English titles Performed in a double bill with La vida breve
Puccini’s only outright comedy is based on an episode in Dante’s Inferno, and Christopher Alden’s new production locates the action in the early Renaissance, at a time when medieval cobwebs were blown away by the fresh air of radical new thinking and creative innovation. The production also nods slyly in the direction of the timeless themes which Puccini exploits to brilliantly farcical effect – after all, those scheming relatives may bear an uncanny resemblance to our own family members! With its vivid characterization and the spontaneity of its musical invention, Gianni Schicchi is a comic masterpiece in miniature, and features one of Puccini’s best-loved arias, ‘O mio babbino caro’.
Richard Rodgers Revival of 2012 production & Oscar Hammerstein II 1945
Carousel
Cast includes:
Claire Boulter, Gillene Butterfield, Yvonne Howard, Joseph Shovelton Conductor James Holmes Director Jo Davies Set and Costume Designer
Anthony Ward
Carousel is a story of love, loss and the possibility of redemption. Fairground barker Billy Bigelow is quick to anger, but he is loved by a woman, Julie Jordan, who keeps faith with him despite his flaws. It is also a vivid portrait of a society: a fishing community in New England ready to celebrate the joys of living as well as to face its hardships square on.
Lighting Designer Bruno Poet Choreographer Kay Shepherd Choreographer (Ballet)
Kim Brandstrup Video Designer Andrzej Goulding
Lasts approximately 3 hours Sung in English A co-production with the Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris
Asked if he had ever been tempted to write an opera, Richard Rodgers replied that he had, but that Carousel was the closest that he ever came to doing so. The score is studded with classic numbers, including ‘If I Loved You’, ‘June is Bustin’ Out All Over’, ‘Soliloquy’ and, of course, ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’. Jo Davies’s vibrant production, highly praised when it was first seen in Leeds, Salford and London in 2012, is moving and uplifting in equal measure. ‘Opera North has a fine record of presenting Broadway classics, and this new production does a rich piece of musical theatre great honour.’ Daily Telegraph
Richard Wagner 1843
Cast includes: The Dutchman Béla Perencz Senta Alwyn Mellor Daland Mats Almgren Erik Mati Turi
The Flying Dutchman Having performed all four instalments of the Ring cycle in successive years, Opera North continues its Wagnerian voyage with the work that the composer himself regarded as the true beginning of his career as a musical dramatist.
Mary Ceri Williams Steersman Mark Le Brocq Conductor Richard Farnes Concert Staging Peter Mumford
Lasts approximately 2 hours 30 mins with no interval Sung in German with English titles Financially supported by the
Opera North Future Fund
Perhaps one reason for this assessment is that the myth of the Dutchman, doomed to wander the seas eternally unless he finds redemption through a woman’s faithful love, treats of themes that were to recur throughout the rest of Wagner’s career. From this material, he constructed a thrillingly taut music drama that grips from the first, storm-tossed notes of the famous overture, to the work’s resplendent final moments of transfiguration. Like Opera North’s highly acclaimed Ring, The Flying Dutchman will be presented in a concert staging by Peter Mumford, and conducted by the Company’s Music Director Richard Farnes. The principal singers all made their mark in the Opera North Ring: Béla Perencz (Wotan) and Alwyn Mellor (Sieglinde) in Die Walküre, and Mats Almgren (Fafner) and Mati Turi (title role) in Siegfried.
Jonathan Dove & Alasdair Middleton 2009
New production
Swanhunter Howard Assembly Room, Leeds 16–18 April 2015
Conductor Catriona Beveridge Director Hannah Mulder Designer / Puppet Direction
Rachael Canning Lasts approximately 1 hour Sung in English An Opera North / The Wrong Crowd co-production
Lemminkäinen is determined to travel to the icy north in search of a bride, against his mother’s wishes. There, impossible tasks await him: he must face the Devil’s Elk, the Swan on Death’s River – and in the shadows, an unseen danger lurks. Based on a tale from the Finnish folk epic the Kalevala, Swanhunter is a chamber opera written by the composer and librettist of Opera North’s hugely successful The Adventures of Pinocchio. Scored for six singers accompanied by six instrumentalists, Swanhunter is a celebration of the power of song, designed specifically for a family audience – for adults just as much as for children. Opera North gave the world premiere of Swanhunter in the Howard Assembly Room in Leeds in 2009. For this brand new production, Opera North collaborates for the first time with the acclaimed theatre company The Wrong Crowd to create an inventive fusion of opera, puppetry and live action.
Performance Diary September – November 2014
January – March 2015
All performances start at 7.00pm.
All performances start at 7.00pm.
Leeds Grand Theatre
Theatre Royal Newcastle
Leeds Grand Theatre
Theatre Royal Newcastle
Sat 20 Sep Sat 27 Sep Fri 3 Oct Sat 4 Oct Sat 11 Oct Fri 17 Oct Sat 18 Oct Thu 23 Oct Fri 24 Oct Sat 25 Oct Tue 28 Oct Wed 29 Oct Thu 30 Oct Fri 31 Oct Sat 1 Nov
Tue 11 Nov Wed 12 Nov Thu 13 Nov Fri 14 Nov Sat 15 Nov
Sat 24 Jan Fri 30 Jan Sat 31 Jan Thu 5 Feb Fri 6 Feb Wed 11 Feb Sat 14 Feb Tue 17 Feb Wed 18 Feb Thu 19 Feb Fri 20 Feb Sat 21 Feb Wed 25 Feb Thu 26 Feb Fri 27 Feb Sat 28 Feb
Tue 3 Mar Wed 4 Mar Thu 5 Mar Fri 6 Mar Sat 7 Mar
La traviata La traviata La traviata The Coronation of Poppea The Coronation of Poppea La traviata The Bartered Bride La traviata The Coronation of Poppea The Bartered Bride La traviata The Bartered Bride The Coronation of Poppea The Bartered Bride La traviata
The Bartered Bride La traviata The Bartered Bride La traviata The Coronation of Poppea
The Lowry, Salford Quays Tue 18 Nov Wed 19 Nov Thu 20 Nov Fri 21 Nov Sat 22 Nov
The Bartered Bride La traviata The Bartered Bride La traviata The Coronation of Poppea
Theatre Royal Nottingham Tue 25 Nov Wed 26 Nov Thu 27 Nov Fri 28 Nov Sat 29 Nov
The Bartered Bride La traviata The Bartered Bride La traviata The Coronation of Poppea
The Marriage of Figaro The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi La traviata La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi The Marriage of Figaro La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi
La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro
The Lowry, Salford Quays Tue 10 Mar Wed 11 Mar Thu 12 Mar Fri 13 Mar Sat 14 Mar
The Marriage of Figaro La traviata La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi La traviata The Marriage of Figaro
Grand Opera House, Belfast Wed 18 Mar Thu 19 Mar Fri 20 Mar Sat 21 Mar
La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro
Theatre Royal Nottingham Tue 24 Mar Wed 25 Mar Thu 26 Mar Fri 27 Mar Sat 28 Mar
La vida breve / Gianni Schicchi La traviata The Marriage of Figaro La traviata The Marriage of Figaro
Performance Diary May – July 2015 All performances start at 7.00pm unless otherwise stated.
Leeds Grand Theatre
Leeds Town Hall
Wed 13 May Carousel Thu 14 May Carousel 2.00pm Thu 14 May Carousel Fri 15 May Carousel Sat 16 May Carousel 2.00pm Sat 16 May Carousel Sun 17 May Carousel 4.00pm Tue 19 May Carousel Wed 20 May Carousel Thu 21 May Carousel 2.00pm Thu 21 May Carousel Fri 22 May Carousel Sat 23 May Carousel
Sat 27 Jun The Flying Dutchman Tue 30 Jun The Flying Dutchman
7.30pm 7.30pm
Sage Gateshead Fri 3 Jul
The Flying Dutchman
7.30pm
Symphony Hall, Birmingham Sun 5 Jul
The Flying Dutchman
4.00pm
Liverpool Philharmonic Hall Wed 8 Jul
The Flying Dutchman
7.30pm
Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham Sat 11 Jul
The Flying Dutchman
7.30pm
The information in this brochure is published in good faith, and is correct at the time of going to print (April 2014), but changes may occasionally be necessary. In the event of unforeseen circumstances, Opera North reserves the right to change casts or performances.
All images created by Opera North. Carousel (2012) photograph by Alastair Muir. Swanhunter image by Mike Cranston.
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