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Scottish Opera – Five:15
The King’s Conjecture – created by Bernard MacLaverty & Gareth Williams The Queens of Govan – created by Suhayl Saadi, Nigel Osborne & Wajahat Khan Dream Angus – created by Alexander McCall Smith, Ben Twist & Stephen Deazley The Perfect Woman – created by Ron Butlin & Lyell Cresswell Gesualdo – created by Ian Rankin & Craig Armstrong
Kate Valentine - soprano Lise Christensen, Elizabeth McCormack mezzo sopranos Robert Ogden – counter tenor Alexander Grove, Peter Van Hulle – tenors Paul Keohone - baritone Nicholas Garrett – bass baritone Orchestra of Scottish Opera/Derek Clark
Riverside Studios, London – 17 August 2008
Scottish Opera’s experimental programme of five 15 minute new operas has proved a success. Although they have made it plain that they don’t regard these short pieces as a new art form divorced from the mainstream of opera composition, nonetheless, they do occupy somewhat different ground, with the same sort of relationship as a short story is to a novel: of necessity compact and episodic in nature.
This must surely be a good way for writers and composers (and Scottish Opera have recruited an impressive line up) to experiment, and perhaps also a good way to entice and captivate a new listeners for whom the prospect of sitting through a 3 hour opera might be too daunting.
Certainly everything possible had been done to make the experience audience friendly, presenting each of us with a comprehensive programme and full libretti. The performances were surtitled and whilst the “sets” were being changed there were short video clips with comments from the creators.
Certainly the initial five operas had very varied plots; a 16th century vengeance killing, a Magritte style dream where pigs go a-picnicking, a classic science fiction story, a legend from the mists of Scottish history and an Asian-Glaswegian’s journey through the streets on a rainy summer night.
The last of these, The Queens of Govan
Gesualdo was the most obviously operatic in nature, with passions running high – murder – revenge - remorse, very skilfully miniaturised and faithfully acted. The dialogue of tenor and counter-tenor voices, for master and servant, proved particularly dramatic and pushed both singers to the edges of their comfort limit.
The Sci-Fi experiment to produce The Perfect Woman was well plotted and musically effective. Dream Angus, delightfully quirky, seemingly inconsequential, and drawing the most from its meagre allowance of props and costumes is the piece that made the strongest impact – great stuff.
As if all this were not enough, in the foyer and on the riverside terrace before and after the show and during the leisurely interval “bite-sized” excerpts were performed.
This rare appearance in London of Scottish Opera had drawn a sizable audience, with a good sprinkling of establishment people not too often seen at “Fringe” events.
Serena Fenwick
See also Opera-at-the-Boundary [Editor] |
[illustrated] was musically the most interesting, with improvised raags blending into the classical score to produce a hallucinatory effect. The King’s Conjecture was more conventional musically, with a very well crafted score, but it felt over-compressed, and perhaps the creators will re-visit the idea in a longer time frame?