22/01/25 Opera Scenes

Albert Lortzing Der Wildschütz

Jonathan Cocker director
Andre Chan conductor
Thomas Schulze language coach
Georgy Stepanov repetiteur

Yihui Wang Baron Kronthal
Timothy Mays Graf von Eberbach
Hannah Andrusier Baronin Freimann
Christian Loizou Baculus
Anna-Rose Marshall Die Gräfin

The elderly Baculus has become engaged to Gretchen, but he falls foul of the local Count by poaching venison for the wedding breakfast.  Gretchen offers to plead his case, but it doesn’t seem a good idea as the Count is a notorious letcher.  A student appears who offers to visit the Count disguised as Gretchen.  The ‘student’ is actually the Count’s newly, and happily, widowed sister, Baroness Friemann.  It will also give her the chance to look at the man her brother wants her to marry, Baron Kronthal.  The Baron and the Count play a game of billiards while both admiring the charms of ‘Gretchen’.  An inebriated Baculus really doesn’t know what is going on.  Suddenly the lights go out and the Countess enters, rescuing the beleaguered ‘Gretchen’.  They all bid each other goodnight and retire for the evening.

Wolf-Ferrari Le donne curiose

Jonathan Cocker director
Jasper Lecon conductor
Antonia Sotgiu language coach
Robin Humphreys repetiteur

Ruby Hendry Beatrice
Sophia Yang Rosaura
Tamsin Sandford Smith Eleonora
Sophie Akka Columbina

At the home of Ottavio, his wife Beatrice, daughter Rosaura, their friend Eleanora and servant Columbina try to work out what the men do behind the closed doors of their club, to which they are denied entry.  Their theories include orgies of women, alchemy and things too horrible to mention. They hatch a plot to visit the club.

W A Mozart Cosi fan tutte

Jonathan Cocker director
Rosina Flueckiger conductor
Antonia Sotgiu language coach
Tom Pieczora repetiteur

Johannes Gerges Don Alfonso
Aaron Peters Ferrando
Theodore Murphy-Jelley Guglielmo
Ruth Harley Despina
Maeve Herd Fiordiligi
Yu Chinen Dorabella

Don Alfonso introduces the disguised Guglielmo and Ferrando to Despina.  If they can convince her of their new identities, the battle is half won.  Despina is amazed at the two ‘visitors’ and cannot begin to understand their strange manners and where they are from.  Fiordiligi and her sister, Dorabella, are horrified to find the two men in their house and insist that they leave declaring their devotion to their betrothed. The men have other ideas and start, much to the horror of the sisters, to try and seduce them.