Page 23 - FINAL_Theatre of Sound Coverage Book

thin arts education, there is always a new audience to be introduced to La Traviata, Carmen, and
La Bohème. At the same time, we have seen how rapidly and how widely operagoers with open
ears have responded to George Benjamin’s Written on Skin, Brett Dean’s Hamlet and Thomas
Adès’s The Exterminating Angel – the repertory is regenerating.

Let’s get away from stagings that simply reinforce the idea of opera as part of a glorious
unchanging tradition. What gives opera its shattering appeal is that it can be forever challenging
our preconceptions and taking us into new and strange areas of elemental feeling and emotion. In
this country we have been lucky enough to have lived through an operatic generation ranging from
supreme traditional-style stagings by Peter Hall to boldly adventurous reworkings by Peter Sellars,
with many more shades in between by a cohort of great directors from Nicholas Hytner and David
Pountney to Deborah Warner and Katie Mitchell. But now I feel there is a lack here of the work of
leading continental directors who have produced stimulating, controversial work in Aix, Salzburg,
and Berlin (no doubt with massive budgets): Romeo Castellucci, Dimitri Tcherniakov, Ivo van
Hove.

Charles Castronovo as Rodolfo and Simona Mihai in the Royal Opera's La Boheme CREDIT:
Robbie Jack

We have a new generation of young directors such as Netia Jones ready to explore digital means to
enhance our experience, but do we have the progression routes to develop new directing talent?
Our singers are well established: we have a fantastic generation, from those who have already
achieved international acclaim, Sarah Connolly, Bryn Terfel, Simon Keenlyside, to those on the
cusp of world fame, Sophie Bevan, Allan Clayton, Nicky Spence; it will be a scandal if travel
restrictions prevent them from being heard.

As the season begins, opera is ready to surprise and envelop us again. When Dr Johnson coined his
memorable phrase centuries ago that opera was “an exotic and irrational entertainment”, he
added: “it has always been combated, but has always prevailed.” And so it will today.

Nicholas Kenyon’s first review will appear in next Wednesday’s paper