Two stars were unveiled at the opening of the new Grange Park: Tenor Joseph Calleja, singing his first ever Cavaradossi in Tosca, and founder Wasfi Kani’s stunning new opera house.
Tosca
Grange Park Opera, Surrey Until July 2
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Two stars were unveiled at the opening of the new Grange Park, just established in the grounds of Bamber Gascoigne’s recently inherited historic house, West Horsley Place in Surrey: the Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja, singing his first ever Cavaradossi in Tosca, and Grange Park founder Wasfi Kani’s stunning new opera house.
The 750-seat theatre – modelled on La Scala, Milan, with a horseshoe shape and four tiers – is a near miracle, having been constructed by Wasfi, her architect Anthony Smith and a dedicated team of builders in less than a year.
It has excellent acoustics and provides a fitting setting for Calleja’s honeyed tones as a more than usually interesting Cavaradossi. Calleja’s Cavaradossi is not just an ardent lover, singing his two showpiece arias most beautifully; he also makes use of his rugby prop-forward build to stand up valiantly against the murderous Scarpia and his henchmen.
Roland Wood doesn’ t have the vocal rasp of an ideal Scarpia but his is a hardworked and ultimately winning interpretation, fully deserving the pantomime-villain boos he secured, to his obvious pleasure, at the end on opening night.
As for Ekaterina Metlova’s Tosca, least said, soonest mended. She just lacks the physical and vocal allure to portray credibly a heroine who was supposedly the toast of Rome. She isn’ t a fitting partner for Calleja. But then who is?
Gianluca Marciano conducts Puccini’s music well, and the sound of his orchestra emerges with great clarity from the pit – another tick in the box for the new theatre.
Director Peter Relton presents the drama vividly, and traditionally, in the best sense of the word. I am sure Puccini, a consummate man of the theatre, would have approved.
The Grange Festival
Alresford, Hampshire Until July 9
Carmen (Until July 8)
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John Wilson Orchestra: A Celebration of Rodgers & Hammerstein and Rodgers & Hart
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Nature abhors a vacuum, and into the space left by Wasfi Kani a new Grange Festival has emerged under the leadership of the distinguished countertenor Michael Chance.
The old theatre has been refurbished, and the grounds cleared of a lot of scrub, revealing the tranquil lake. The in-house dining facilities have been spruced up and spacious new picnic tents have been erected.
What could possibly go wrong? Well, sadly, the festival’s Carmen, the most perverse production of Bizet’s masterpiece I have ever seen.
Director Annabel Arden has cut out most of the recitatives (sung or spoken dialogue) . Good news. The bad news is that she has replaced them with two so-called ‘comperes’ , an African couple who wander around chuntering in a way that amused them far more than it did me.
Why? I am sure Arden thinks she is making some profound point here, but to me it’s just plain irritating. She would have been better employed teaching the Israeli mezzo Na’ ama Goldman to be a pulsating Carmen, the femme fatale from the fag factory.
Sadly, poor Goldman is as dull as ditchwater. Perversely, Shelley Jackson’s Micaëla, supposedly the innocent girl next door, is all over Don José like a rash in Act I, showing all the sexiness Carmen so manifestly lacks.
Far better was the John Wilson Orchestra’s Richard Rodgers concert, offering a winning combination of the smoky cabaret songs Rodgers composed to the subtle lyrics of Lorenz Hart and the big-boned showstoppers he wrote for the string of Broadway hits he had with Oscar Hammerstein.
There were substantial extracts from Oklahoma! (which the JWO are doing complete at the Proms, live on BBC television on August 11) , South Pacific, Carousel and The Sound Of Music .
Kim Criswell was especially dazzling in Lorenz Hart’s Keeping My Love Alive, about bumping off irritating husbands. And a new star is born: the young Australian baritone Morgan Pearse, who will appear next as Sid in Britten’s Albert Herring at the Buxton Festival.
