Britten - Albert Herring (Buxton, 2017)

Benjamin Britten - Albert Herring

Buxton Festival, 2017

Justin Doyle, Francis Matthews, Bradley Smith, Heather Shipp, Morgan Pearse, Kathryn Rudge, John Molloy, Yvonne Howard, Nicholas Merryweather, Jeffrey Lloyd-Roberts, Lucy Schaufer, Mary Hegarty, Bonnie Callaghan, Nicholas Challier, Sophie Gallagher, Simeon John-Wake

Buxton Opera House - 19th July 2017

Who would have thought that Benjamin Britten, an outsider to the social and musical establishment, would be the composer who best captures the essential qualities of Englishness in his works? And not just in a kind of idealised fashion in the recounting of historical period drama or even just documenting the contemporary England of his times, but in a manner that captures attitudes and behaviours that are essentially and timelessly English. The social study of Peter Grimes might very well be his masterpiece in that regard, but Albert Herring captures much of the same character with the additional qualities of charm and humour.

It's the nature of the comedy and what is revealed through the brilliance of its wit and the wider detail of the characterisation that may even give weight to the argument for Albert Herring truly being Britten's masterpiece. Never having seen this Britten opera performed before (and not being English myself), I would have been sceptical of such a claim placing this work above Peter Grimes, Billy Budd or even War Requiem, but if there is a case to be made for Albert Herring as Britten's masterpiece, it's seeing it performed in Buxton surrounded by the same kind of characters that it depicts so colourfully up there on the stage. Francis Matthews's production for the 2017 Buxton Festival makes a wholly convincing case for its greatness.

Quite rightly, the principal claim for its greatness lies in the dazzling variety of the opera's musical language that never gets too clever for its own good. Britten develops and reworks musical, choral and motifs that don't just parody or emulate traditional English forms of music but tap into its baroque, folk and pastoral roots much more successfully than in Gloriana. It matches these moreover to specific English situations and character and to a lighter side of life that is loving and affectionate. You could say the same for how Justin Doyle brings those qualities out of the orchestral playing and for how Francis Matthews stages it in the marvellous Buxton production.

The other factor that stands in the favour of Albert Herring is the delightful witty libretto by Eric Crozier, based on a Maupassant story. Like Britten's score it is light and colourful, managing to be evocative of everything English without ever getting nostalgic or self-glorifying about it. How else can a line like 'Swan Vestas' be quite so hilarious? It celebrates the little person, the underdog and it deflates pomposity, finding the essence of Englishness out in its little village craftsmen and tradesmen rather than in the pretentiousness of its authority figures, although even there the work establishes a wonderful and authentic dynamic between its social classes. Even the name Albert Herring, with its regal forename matched to a rather more humble surname somehow manages to sum up everything that the work miraculously manages to achieve.

Surely then I wasn't the only person in the audience who looked on the behaviour around the May Day celebration committee table and thought of the cabinet of the current government? Theresa May, the authoritarian Lady Billings, with her delusions of competence, speaking in meaningless clichés and catch-phrases; Phillip Hammond the mayor managing the purse strings, but that official can manage to subtract 3 from 25 however, so there's a slight difference there; Michael Gove is Mr Gedge the Vicar, with his faith in educating the youth through the Bible, Shakespeare and Foxes Book of Martyrs. It's probably not fair to compare Sid to Boris Johnson, but still, quite the 'May Day' parade indeed.

Who am I kidding? I doubt anyone else would have been thinking such thoughts while enjoying how Francis Matthews directed the proceedings and the satire with a much lighter touch. Which is not to say that the Buxton audience weren't able to recognise and laugh at the gentle poking of fun at characters they would surely meet on a daily basis or at attitudes and behaviours which still persist. And to go by the current Conservative government whose actions are beyond satire really, it just goes to show how some characteristics are true and universal. And human. Which is what is great about Albert Herring and why it will endure.

The singing at Buxton really couldn't be faulted. Bradley Smith's brightly sung Albert is an innocent figure from a not so bygone age who needs to throw off that English reserve and stand up to his 'betters'. Sid and Nancy (now there's a prophetic pairing of names in respect of rebellious youth) are also wonderfully sung and characterised by Morgan Pearse and Kathryn Rudge. Heather Shipp is a fine Mrs Herring. The 'character' roles are an important part of the work and taken colourfully by Yvonne Howard as Lady Billows, Jeffrey Lloyd-Roberts as Mr Upfold the Mayor, Nicholas Merryweather as Mr Gedge the Vicar and John Molloy as Superintendent Budd. With impeccable direction, light-hearted comic detail and visual jokes to go with the musical delights on offer, there was much to enjoy in this fabulously entertaining production of Britten's comic masterpiece.

Links: Buxton International Festival

Rimsky-Korsakov - The Snow Maiden (Belfast, 2017)

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov - The Snow Maiden

Opera North, 2017

Martin Pickard, John Fulljames, Aoife Miskelly, Bonaventura Bottone, Dean Robinson, Yvonne Howard, James Creswell, Joseph Shovelton, Claire Pascoe, Heather Lowe, Elin Pritchard, Phillip Rhodes

Grand Opera House, Belfast - 17th March 2017

The Snow Maiden has all the classic fairy-tale elements; folklore, dreams, love, magic and poignant tragedy. All those elements are elevated to suitably epic proportions in Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's opera version of Aleksandr Ostrovsky's play, tying the magical qualities of the story Cunning Little Vixen-like into the every-day magic of nature and the changing of the seasons; the magical changes that are all part of the rhythm of life. John Fulljames's production for Opera North ambitiously and inventively adds another level onto the proceedings that joins up and connects those different levels. It's impressive, it's beautiful, but unfortunately it's also just a little dull.

But just a little, and disappointingly that seems to be down to the nature of the story and Rimsky-Korsakov's rather academic scoring of the work, which never seems to have either the verve or grandeur of his work in The Tsar's Bride, Sadko or The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh. What The Snow Maiden has in common with each of those works - and with the fairy-tale satire of The Golden Cockerel - is an essential Russian character, and that at least is authentically retained in Opera North's production which not only presents its themes well but meaningfully elaborates upon them.

John Fulljames with production designer Giles Cadle (who does great work also on Hansel and Gretel and La Cenerentola) attempts to anchor Rimsky-Korsakov's rather serious minded treatment of the fairy tale by finding another great way to create magic out of reality. Again, it seems to arise out of the need of someone living in less than favourable circumstances to find a way to escape from their humdrum reality and live a dream of life that has a more meaningful and hopefully romantic purpose. The 'Snow Maiden' here is a seamstress in a clothing factory.

The changing of the seasons is evoked in this setting by the winter clothes line being put aside for the new spring fashions. One girl on the production line looks like she is lost in a dream, caught up in the changing times, wondering if this year is going to be the year that someone comes and melts her heart like the story of the Snow Maiden whose heart is too frozen to love. It's a simple framing device - one that Fulljames often seems to favour - that ties legend, folklore and the power of storytelling to reality in a way that makes it come alive; and in the context of the Opera North season of fairy-tales, it's a consistent theme that gives the magical element a relatable basis.

Thereafter the production manages to place the fairy-tale as another level on top of the reality that is always present beneath. At times, the storybook imagery of The Snow Maiden takes over, at others the dreaming seamstress seems to be drawn back to the real world, where competition and jealousy takes root between the girls over the handsome supervisor Lel, and over the upcoming marriage of one of the working girls Kupova to her fiancé Mizgir. Again in this Opera North season, it's the effective use of projections that permit such rapid and subtle transitions to be made not only between different scenes, but between different levels of reality, dream and the fluid and indefinable characteristic of what constitutes magic.

In The Snow Maiden it is fairly clear that the magic lies in the miracle of the changing seasons, in the transformations nature brings not only to the land, but to the influence and change it exerts over the temperament, mood and nature people of the land as the years go by. There are powerful changes occurring within the young girl who identifies with the Snow Maiden, her thoughts turning to love, to finding the right partner, unsure whether she is ready to give her heart away and whether it will be accepted. The language of nature and the seasons used in the libretto makes the implications plain, with there being much talk of plucking flowers and scattering seeds.

Using shifting abstract patterns, the projections not only add a level of magic-world beauty to the production - and it really looks spectacular - Fulljames and Cadle's designs also emphasis the connections between magic, nature and the real world. The setting of the drama within a clothing factory certainly makes the sentiments of love, jealousy and betrayal apparent and relevant, but the fairy-tale layer subjectively heightens the feelings as they are experienced by a young and sensitive girl. It's the projections that blend them together so well, making connections between lace patterns and snowflakes, the patterns spreading like growing shoots, the sap rising as the seasons pass and the personal dilemma of the Snow Maiden reaches a critical level

Clearly it's a well thought out production, where everything blends and works together wonderfully, keeping it moving and flowing when it could otherwise be quite static; it looks spectacular and magical at the same time. The singing is also of the highest order; Aoife Miskelly's deeply heartfelt Snow Maiden contrasted to good effect with Heather Lowe's warmth and sincerity as Lel. There is greater diversity in character and voice that further enriched the production, notably in Elin Pritchard's down-to-earth, heart-on-her-sleeve Kupava, whose laughter crackled through the drama, and on the part of Phillip Rhodes as the passionate Mizgir.

Fulljames's book-ending framing also manages to help take the cold edge off the inevitable tragic conclusion that comes to a Snow Maiden in the summer. There ought to be a positive side to this outcome of the passing seasons and the production supports this, making it a little more glorious and cheerful without taking anything away from the wistful tone of sadness. Despite every effort however, the production still can't quite overcome the inherent serious-minded gravity of the proceedings. Martin Pickard's conducting of the score captured all the elegance of the arrangements and the beauty of Rimsky-Korsakov's composition, but it still never managed to provide that spark that would melt the core of ice that lies at the heart of The Snow Maiden.

Links: Opera North

Britten - The Turn of the Screw (NI Opera, 2016 - Belfast)

Benjamin Britten - The Turn of the Screw

NI Opera, 2016

Nicholas Chalmers, Oliver Mears, Katie Bird, Garbhan McEnoy, Sam Furness, Giselle Allen, Yvonne Howard, Lucia Vernon-Long

Lyric Theatre, Belfast - 11 March 2016

There are many ways to explore and interpret the themes and the suggestion laid down by Benjamin Britten in his adaptation of Henry James' sinister little tale. Even in a revival of its 2012 production, NI Opera's The Turn of the Screw can reveal other facets of this endlessly fascinating little piece with a few changes of casting and a little tweak of directorial emphasis here and there. Essentially, the tone and the ambiguity of the production remain largely the same, but the whole idea of fear dominating the direction of the drama seemed to be more pronounced in a way that opened up other possibilities.

Fear, of course, is an integral part of what The Turn of the Screw is all about; it is a ghost story after all. It's perhaps not necessary though for the audience to feel fear in the way that a traditional ghost story sets out to do. That would actually be harder to achieve, since everyone has different things that scare them and evidently not everyone believes in ghosts. One of the other problems of this approach is that ghost stories aren't quite as scary when you know what is coming, and I have to admit that I didn't find this production quite as chilling as I remember it being four years ago. Despite this, the sense of fear in the 2016 revival of the production was palpable and effective in other ways.

The Turn of the Screw is more a study of fear than it is a traditional tale to scare the reader or the listener. Fear is contagious in the way that it spreads through Bly household here, and it isn't too much of stretch to consider it a model for how fear spreads in a wider community. Henry James didn't need to overstate the psychological implications of repressed impulses of the Governess in relation to the Victorian society of his time, and the wider implications don't need to be be spelled out for a modern audience either if the telling of the tale is true. When you have ghosts in a story this could present a problem, but the key to the story lies in how convincing we find the perspective and the actions of the Governess.

In as far as it was sung and played by Katie Bird, the importance of the role of the Governess as the propagator of fear in The Turn of the Screw is wonderfully effective. Fear, or at least anxiety that will later develop into fear, is evident from her first appearance on the stage just after the narrator's prologue. Will she like her new post? Will the children be nice? Will her employer be pleased with her? These concerns develop into a kind of over-protectiveness that infects Mrs Grose and leads, arguably, to a kind of mass hallucination that manifests the fear in the form of ghosts. Or it could be that the constant watching over Flora and Miles and pushing adult concerns down on them doesn't allow the children to be children.

What could be considered to be normal healthy behaviour for children, even if they are just a little bit naughty, is viewed with suspicion by the anxious Governess. It could be that the Governess, prompted by Mrs Grose's distaste for former employees, dredges up issues related to Peter Quint and Miss Jessel, conflates them with her own complexes and twists them in the minds of the children and the Governess into something more sinister. A lot of this is just speculation, and it's very much dependent upon what one wants to read into the work, but the greatness of The Turn of the Screw is that the ambiguity it creates around such situations allows events to be interpreted in a variety of ways.

It's harder to retain that sense of ambiguity on the stage, where concrete decisions and interpretations of one sort or another have to be made, but I think Oliver Mears' production manages to do this very well. I've already covered how the direct and simple stage designs work effectively to open up and close down the drama in my review of the original 2012 production at the Theatre at the Mill in Newtownabbey, and it still works here. What was great about the revival of the production, seen this time at the Lyric Theatre in Belfast, was experiencing how well the singing and the musical performances were also attuned to project this sense of 'fear' consuming everyone who comes into contact with the Governess.

Principally, a lot of that was to do with Katie Bird's interpretation of the role. This was an outstanding singing performance that projected the fears of the Governess outward. There's a balance to be found between appearing to be neurotic or all out crazy and just letting anxiety break down the Governess's grip on reality, and Katie Bird covered that gradual disintegration almost imperceptibly. The Governess isn't aware of the fear she is sowing, believing her behaviour to be reasonable, proportionate, and indeed proper, but there's an edge of hysteria that becomes more and more apparent as events spiral and ghosts appear, and that was well integrated into the performance.

What is marvellous is not only could you detect this in how Bird sang and played the role, but the acoustics of the Lyric and Nicholas Chalmers' conducting allowed you hear how well Britten also scores and ramps up the tension, tightening the screw with little musical runs on the piano and the double bass. It's far from just eerie atmospherics and is suggestive of something much more complex in its psychology. Having just won an award for his ETO Hoffmann, Sam Furness was a good fit for this production's Peter Quint, while Giselle Allen reprised her chilling Miss Jessel. It's telling however that this production and the careful direction didn't allow either of the ghostly apparitions to overshadow Bird's Governess. Garbhan McEnoy brought a brittle vulnerability to Miles, working wonderfully alongside Lucia Vernon-Long's innocently teasing Flora to keep that delicious sense of ambiguity that is exploited so well on every level by NI Opera's still effective production of this ever intriguing work.

Links: NI Opera

Britten - The Turn of the Screw

Benjamin Britten - The Turn of the Screw

NI Opera, 2012

Nicholas Chalmers, Oliver Mears, Fiona Murphy, Andrew Tortise, Giselle Allen, Yvonne Howard, Lucia Vernon, Thomas Copeland

Theatre at the Mill, Newtownabbey, 2 March 2012

There was nothing too clever attempted in NI Opera’s new production of The Turn of the Screw, certainly nothing as ambitious as their award-winning production ofTosca on the walls of Derry City, but Britten’s atmospheric little chamber piece doesn’t really need anything more than an intimate environment to achieve optimum effect, and that was certainly achieved with the choice of venue at the Theatre at the Mill in Newtownabbey. The attention to detail then was in letting the music and libretto of this powerful little piece speak for itself, and with the benefit of an excellent cast of fine singers that was admirably achieved.

This is the third production from the recently formed NI Opera that I’ve seen at the Theatre at the Mill (with only one production so far, Hansel and Gretel, at the more traditional venue of the Grand Opera House in Belfast), and while one of those productions was a scaled-down romp through Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld (in conjunction with Scottish Opera), the venue has been particularly well-suited to the theatrical intimacy of something like Menotti’s The Medium and now with Britten’s The Turn of the Screw. The smaller-scale staging of course makes the works suitable for touring – an important remit of the opera company to attract new audiences from traditionally neglected parts of the province – but it’s also the best way to introduce an audience to the close relationship between a music score and a theatrical performance that takes expression to another level, and in that respect The Turn of the Screw is perhaps the most challenging of the NI Opera productions thus far.

Henry James’s novella is well-enough known, adapted numerous times for TV and cinema, and highly influential in the field of Victorian ghost stories because of the dark ambiguities that lie at the heart of the work. The story of a Governess who is engaged to look after two children, Flora and Miles, on a country estate, there are disturbing hints of child abuse or at least bad influence in the children’s relationship with two former servants, Quint and Miss Jessel, who had been engaged there previously. The Governess, half in love with the guardian of the children but forbidden from disturbing from his work in the city on any pretext, seems to conjure the spirits of the malevolent former servants – both now dead – partly out of concern for strange behaviour she witnesses in the children, partly from her own repressed urges at the suggestion of Quint and Miss Jessel’s scandalous behaviour, and partly as an excuse to get in touch with the children’s guardian.

Nothing however can be pinned-down to simple cause and effect in The Turn of the Screw and there’s no easy separation of rational and supernatural. All of what happens could be caused by the projections of the mind of the Governess, her behaviour, repression, suspicion and hysteria (heighted by stories told to her by housekeeper Mrs Grose) and her desire to protect the innocence of the children from baser adult desires (that she herself is subject to), in turn creating its own pernicious stifling repressive atmosphere. Or it could indeed be that she and the children do indeed operate under the influence of past events instigated by Quint and Miss Jessel, who are shown as ghosts and apparitions who appear throughout the work and seem to interact with the children, awakening troubling memories.

The Turn of the Screw is by no means then an easy work on a narrative or musical level, particularly for a newer audience in a non-traditional venue for an opera, but the power of the work and its ability to provoke and unsettle can surely be felt by anyone. It’s not just about creating effects with half-glimpsed apparitions in dark rooms, but it’s rather in the haunting motifs of the score and the singing that other ambiguities and unsettling ideas are suggested. If the set designed by Annemarie Woods for the NI Opera production tended towards functional minimalism, and the direction of Oliver Mears didn’t seem to attempt to add any new conceptual spin to the story, it was all the more to allow the score to speak of these ambiguities itself and not point the listener towards any safe or easy conclusion.

The sets in fact, were highly effective, not only suggesting mood and location with the shifting of walls, doors and windows, but in their arrangement being capable of opening up space or closing it down with suffocating angles. Mears directorial touches did emphasise some unnatural closeness developing in the physical contact between the Governess and Miles, but this relationship with the younger boy is undoubtedly a crucial aspect of the work, certainly in as far as it concerns Britten and his own inclinations (or indeed those of Henry James), and it shouldn’t be overlooked. At the same time, it didn’t attempt to impose a definitive reading, and it’s left – as it should be – to each member of the audience to draw their own conclusions. The Turn of the Screw can indeed be just a ghost story if that’s all you want to see in it, and Britten’s music can be seen as purely spectrally unsettling as well as being suggestive of other abstract notions and concepts.

While the score – brilliantly performed by the orchestra under the direction of Nicholas Chalmers – and the setting for the drama provided much to consider in its own terms, they were most successful in the relationship it formed with the singers. Really, the singing in all the principal roles was beyond reproach, with Fiona Murphy pushing all the ambiguities of the role of the Governess with some fine singing, Andrew Tortise a seductively dangerous Quint, and Giselle Allen reprising the role of Miss Jessel that she performed last year to such powerful effect at Glyndebourne. Yvonne Howard however deserves special mention for Mrs Grose, one of the best singers I’ve heard in the role. The children also, critical to the whole ambiguity between innocence and experience in the opera were, were played well by Lucia Vernon and particularly young Thomas Copeland, who sang Miles wonderfully, his refrain of ‘Malo’ simultaneously wistful, regretful and sinister, and his famous condemnation of Quint at the finale was powerfully effective.