Clare got up early and went to the eight o'clock this morning, to give herself time to prepare for her trip later in the day by bus and train to East Grinstead for a Eurythmy conference. I went to the ten thirty Parish Eucharist at St Catherine's. It was a Family Eucharist for Harvest Festival. I didn't feel much like socialising afterwards so I went home, and started making lunch.
Clare had so sacrifice her afternoon opera ticket in order to go to this conference, so she invited Fran to take her place. She'd also invited friends Russell and Jackie to for Rossini's 'La Cenerentola'. All three are her Anthroposophical circle friends, and they aren't bothered that I'm not one of them. In fact Russell and I often have lively conversations about the state of our changing world. As we were on our way out after he asked me, "What's the church have to say about Artificial Intelligence?" As I have done no theological reading on this subject, nor glimpsed any reports I was unable to offer as much as an ad lib response, but promised I'd get back to him on this. He's in his early nineties and is now very frail, but his mind is a keen and penetrating on core human issues as it ever was.
The opera was, yet again, wonderful. Great performances from the singers and an all male chorus singing technically challenging pieces throughout, especially some tricky bel canto duets. This was only the second performance of the run, and in a few places the orchestra seemed to be driving the duettists at a pace they found hard to keep up with. Which made it seem unnecessarily edgy, but no doubt that will improve.
I've never heard anything from this opera before, though musically it's familiar, as you can hear Rossini building on the popular success of his 'Barber of Seville' (the first WNO opera I ever heard over 60 years ago in Cardiff's New Theatre), which was written a year earlier, when he was only 24.
It's a comedy, evoking the pantomime ethos, based on the French version of Cinderella, by Charles Perrault, and it has a strong moral streak to the storyline. There's no fairy magic in getting Cinders to ball, but wise and thoughtful facilitation on the part of the Prince's Privy Counsellor, who secretly sets out to find him a bride. I like this version far better than what gets served up in the British Pantomime season, and believe this has something to do with Ferretti the liberettists's redaction of Perrault's story. Delightfully executed by the company, it certainly pays homage to traditional Pantomime decor and mixed media storytelling in presentation. Frankly, I'd rather see this during the Twelve Days of Christmas than a modern Panto, a medium that has sadly become crass and debased over my theatregoing lifetime.
No comments:
Post a Comment