Prima la musica

Peter sings Shakespeare

(Songs for Shakespeare was the actual title: the Sydney Philharmonia's latest concert, which I saw at the Concert Hall on Friday and Saturday nights.) 

There were a few irritations,  mostly overcome. No definitive list of repertoire ever materialised in the publicity, but in the end I just embraced the mystery, didn't buy a program, and let myself be surprised. I'd been booked for a seat that didn't actually exist, but this gave me the chance to choose a new strategic one from among the mostly empty four front rows. The film clips were exactly the Olivier speeches you'd expect, though sometimes curiously at odds with music which followed. Finzi's "Let Us Garlands Bring" was broken up with bits of Rutter for the choir (grr) but at least it was there, my little heart was set on it. Aforementioned Rutter was decidedly not my cup of twee tea, but the choir was in fine voice in any case. The orchestra had a few nice solo turns too.

And if all the above sounds bit rushed and dismissive, well, that's sort of inevitable. Because for all my in-principle griping about the specific repertoire not being publicised, the fact is that if the Sydney Philharmonia had simply announced "Untitled Concert. Repertoire TBA. Soloist: Peter Coleman-Wright", with no further detail, I'd still have booked for every performance, no questions asked. Peter is enough. He's why I was there, and he's what I want to write about. 

You know,  I'm still not entirely used to this: to a baritone, any baritone, being the object of this sort of adoring completism. The days when only female voices could make a fan of me are long past now: a list of my favourite Australian singers now would probably contain more men than women. But with Peter it has gone a bit beyond that, he's surpassed the other boys and sits up among my sopranos. At the beginning, for me, he was just sort of incidental to the extraordinariness of Cheryl, and thus inevitably overshadowed; but somewhere along the line he became the Tracy to her Hepburn, as captivating in his own right as in partnership with his stunning wife. That doesn't mean he occupies quite the same place in my heart as Cheryl — whatever that place is, it's neither divisible nor transferable — but nevertheless, he must be somewhere nearby, because there I was, two nights in row, front and centre in the Concert Hall, purely in order to hear him. 

In a sense it wouldn't have mattered what he'd sung. I struggle to think of anything he could sing which I wouldn't enjoy, one way or another. But I was, as I say, depending on the Finzi; or rather, I was depending on the first song of the cycle, "Come away, Death", which is just one of those songs that's stayed with me ever since the first time I heard it. I was granted my wish immediately. Alas, the format of the concert meant the cycle was broken up, obliging us to applaud each song individually, but nothing could seriously tamper with the spell Peter cast with each of these beautiful songs. In the jollier songs, he was as lighthearted and endearing as anything, without a trace of affectation; my brain is wired to cringe at the words "hey nonny nonny", but when he sang them, it forgot, and I smiled instead. And if Janet's "Come away, Death" was haunting me when I arrived, it was Peter's "Fear no more the heat o' the sun", which followed me home, and whose singular combination of warmth and eerie stillness is even now playing on my mind. 

The Finzi was one sort of gift. In the second half, we had another: two good, old-fashioned 19th-century arias, magnificently sung. There's a reason every single program bio of this man begins by lauding his versatility. In the Finzi he was in his element. In Verdi he was in his element. In Ambroise Thomas he was in his element. Macbeth's "Perfidi!... Pietà, rispetto, amore" was sensational; in character right to the tips of his fingers, voice aflame and phrasing to die for, every word cracklingly focused. And then he came back, all wry smiles and expansive gestures, for a rollicking rendition of Hamlet's "O vin, dissipe la tristesse", irresistible insouciance underpinned by precision and pretty fabulous French. To finish, he and Brett Weymark led the choir in — what else? — "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" from Kiss Me, Kate. I, selfishly, would rather have kept it as just a duet — the massed voices slightly blunted some of Cole Porter's racier rhymes — but that's another concert. It was still a charming conclusion, and I doubt I was the only one wishing the concert could continue as a Baritone Aria Gala — a night of Peter singing this sort of repertoire is something Opera Australia or the SSO really ought to consider organising. I know I'd go. 

There has been quite a lot of Peter in my life these past few months, but it's all been about Bliss. And as much as I love that opera, and as eternally fond as I am of Harry Joy, I have to say, it was rather wonderful to see and hear him in a different mode. Harry was his creation, he was setting all the precedents and doing it brilliantly, but it's a thrill to be reminded that in repertoire for which there's a hundred years or more worth of precedents, he is just as brilliant. I sat there on the Friday, in the wake of his Macbeth aria, and I thought: it really doesn't get much better than this. Bias and background and whatever else aside, the fact is that to sit and listen to this exceptional singer as he plies his trade is an operatic experience to be cherished by anyone, anywhere. 

And it's certainly an experience cherished by me. I know, I don't really need to point that out any more; the extent to which Peter has dominated my blogging of late is proof enough. Well, what can I say? I think he's completely deserved all of it. This might be my last excuse to write about him for a while now, but the presence of Peter Coleman-Wright in my own little operatic universe is a continuing revelation and delight. I have, it seems, found myself a favourite baritone, and I've a feeling that won't be changing any time soon.

The end of the beginning

At first I thought about titling this post "The End of Bliss", and then I realised that was completely inappropriate, because it wasn't. Closing night in Melbourne might have concluded the opera's premier Australian run, but that's as much finality as I'm willing to acknowledge. And not just because there's still the two Edinburgh Festival performances and the new production in Hamburg to come. What I saw on Saturday evening was an opera with all the polish, vitality and pliability to keep on keeping on, beyond this country, this cast or the first flurry of hype. Bliss as an opera, as an independent musical entity, has emerged with all the strength and polish I had hoped for, and more (and in different flavours, if you can have flavoured polish) besides. 

That's not to say that it outdid my Sydney experience. It didn't, and it didn't need to, and in fact I'm not even sure that the comparison is relevant. I mean, if I do throw them all in together, then I suppose I would rate this as perhaps the third-best performance of the seven I've seen. That sounds awful, doesn't it? Consider that the best was one of the thrillingest nights of opera I've ever had, however, and it's not nearly so bad. And even number seven on that list, if I worked it out, would still have been an excellent performance, because there weren't any that weren't. I loved it every time, and the difference from performance to performance has really not been so much in the degree of that love as in the variety.

So Sydney Bliss and Melbourne Bliss have been two different creatures. Two, rather than seven. I saw it six times here, and while each performance of course has its own individual existence — and for many people constituted the entirety of their Bliss experience — for me, the season felt much more like six segments of a single, developing whole.  And it also felt — there's no other way to put this — like it was mine. I felt (and still feel, and will probably always feel) a degree of possessiveness about Bliss, and it's not surprising that that emotion was strongest during its Sydney season. Sydney's Bliss is the Bliss I ate, breathed and slept, and the one with which I fell in love. 

Melbourne's isn't. But it's many other things, and above all, it's the Bliss which properly crystallised the sentiments in my first paragraph. After a month off and a change of setting, I was able detach myself just a little, and to engage with Bliss on terms closer to those on which I'd engage with any performance of a favourite opera — still besotted, still (let's face it) biased, but nevertheless, not personally invested in quite the same way. Which, while less intense and, alright, a bit less fun than my Sydney experience, confirmed what I had already more or less concluded, which is that Bliss doesn't depend on my or anyone else's personal attachment to be brilliant. It just is brilliant. 

This has all come out a bit more clinically than I expected. (Although to be properly clinical it would probably need fewer italics.) But, hey, you get enough breathless rhapsodising from me anyway, without my manufacturing it for a performance which elicited a different sort of positive response. I'm sure you get my drift; at least, I hope you do.

I've also neglected to say anything much about the actual performance. Which is sort of ridiculous of me, although then again, I don't know what there is to add — all previous praise applies, basically. Merlyn Quaife was a wonder, Lorina Gore was adorable, David Corcoran is Going Places, Taryn Fiebig owns the role of Lucy in perpetuity, Barry Ryan was brilliant (and his Alex was feistier in Melbourne than in Sydney), Kanen Breen is a fiendishly good adlibber of insults. You know all this. There were a couple of tweaks in the staging — Harry and Honey pledged their love further downstage, Alex and Harry did an impressively elaborate office-chair dance instead of just skidding around, and Honey was, inexplicably, a blonde. I think a couple of spoken syllables are now sung, probably just for clarity's sake. Brett Dean's unfathomably rich score is even richer played from a decent orchestra pit; I was hearing things all night that I hadn't even known were there. I did struggle a little (from Row H-for-Harry) with the effect of said pit, and of the larger space, on the balance between singers and orchestra; I suspect I've spoilt myself a bit here by always sitting so close. The foyers and escalators of the Arts Centre continue to defeat both my navigational sense and my phone. And what else — oh, yes, that's right — Peter Coleman-Wright was and is made of magic, his Harry beautiful beyond words. He's a privilege, a delight and a total star, and I — in case you hadn't noticed — just think the world of him. 

And now I think that really might be it. We've reached the end of the beginning and the beginning of — well, who knows. The future. A long, happy life. As they say in the films, it's not goodbye, just au revoir. It's been grand, Bliss, and heaven knows I'll miss you — but I've a good feeling about you, and I think we'll meet again.

Bliss, a love story

Heaven knows I have channeled all my anticipatory energies into Bliss.  I read the novel, bought (though never watched) the DVD, listened to the orchestral suite and other Brett Dean bits. I promoted it online with a determination which surprised even me. I threw myself into the Twitter campaign. I read every interview and article I could. I mastered the art of subtitles on Movie Maker, just so I could make a surreal Downfall parody. I compulsively photographed the poster and scanned city streets for the back-of-taxi ads. I organised a costume party. And I booked tickets for the entire season before I'd even seen a single performance, an honour not even accorded to Arabella or Peter Grimes. After a long time just being quietly intrigued that it was happening — and pleased that Peter Coleman-Wright was in it because, you know, I quite like him — I turned Bliss into a sort of crucial life event, and the focus of as much explosive excitement as I could muster. 

Which was reckless of me, I suppose, but what could I do? After all, there was never really any possibility that I'd hate it. Even if the music had been unbearable — though frankly, I've never yet run up against any operatic music I'd describe as such — the cast, director and source material were all guarantees against a total trainwreck. And let's be honest, any evening involving three hours in the company of Peter Coleman-Wright is fine by me. Still, lack of hatred — or even just moderate esteem — isn't nearly enough, especially not for a enthusiast like me. What I wanted was the thing I couldn't guarantee. I wanted to fall in love. I could feign a more rational outlook if required, and find a hundred things about Bliss to admire and respect, but the fact is that without that ultimate seduction, the experience would always have been less than complete. 

And it happened. But not right away. I mean, opening night was special. It had to be. It was a capital-E Event. It was the culmination of so many hopes and expectations and of so much preparation, and it was wonderful. It was the only night that garnered a decent standing ovation, too. It still wasn't my night, though. Bliss had caught my imagination and sparked a good deal of affection, but it hadn't captured my heart just yet. Instead, it was my brain that was engaged. I was looking at it lovingly, but critically too: spotting flaws alongside delights. Opening night gave me plenty of fodder for a rave review, and that's essentially what I gave it, but the urge to rush out into the night and declare my love? That hadn't kicked in yet.

Already, though, I felt that it might. While I was troubled by what I perceived as the opera's theatrical shortcomings, I also felt that these had as much do with my own struggle to separate the opera from the novel as anything else. Because on that first night, of course, the novel was my only point of reference — I had nothing else to compare it to. Afterwards, I could compare it to itself; I could respond to each performance in the context of those which had come before, and thus approach the opera as a separate entity. The trick was to convince myself that the material which Amanda Holden had necessarily jettisoned in adapting the novel wasn't now missing from the opera — the opera was an alternate Bliss in which that stuff simply didn't exist. And while one performance wasn't nearly enough to begin to take in Brett Dean's unbelievably rich and complex score, I could already feel it seeping into my veins. No, I couldn't hum any of the tunes (well, except "You won't die") after opening night, but unlike more than one reviewer, I find it impossible to view that as some sort of failing — in the style of Groucho Marx, I think I'd tend to distrust that any opera which I could hum after only one hearing.

The second performance was thus a bit of a clincher — I wanted confirmation of my hopes and my optimistic theories, and I got it. The performances were better and less tentative, my reservations about the drama of it began to matter less, and I could feel my mind begin to wrap itself a bit more tightly around the score. It seemed everything was heading in the right direction. I was still waiting for my own personal explosion, but after this one, felt surer it would come. The third performance, the matinée, was the best yet, helped along by what seemed to me the most responsive audience, if also the smallest. 

It was a turning point for me, too. I felt as if  I'd finally caught up with Bliss; that I had absorbed the basic shape and texture of it now, and could thus really focus on the particular glories of a single performance, rather than feel I was still coming to terms with the opera itself. In other words, it had become a part of my repertoire, if still in a fledgling sense — I felt I was coming to Bliss now in, broadly speaking, the same state of mind as I did to Tosca, or as I will to Sonnambula or (tempting fate here) Kat'a Kabanova. Not quite engraved upon my soul like Don Giovanni or Madama Butterfly or La voix humaine, but definitely a part of my musical consciousness. 

Number four — also known as 80s Night — was a little bit different, an amicable conflict between Bliss-as-event and Bliss-as-opera. The event side was magnificent. For once, my somewhat carefully laid plans came to fruition. At interval we met Brett Dean, a completely lovely man and the only person all evening who appreciated my Joy Division t-shirt without being prompted. And afterwards the leading man obligingly came down to inspect us in our finery, managing (as he does) to charm everybody within a ten-metre radius in the process. Programs were signed, compliments offered, photos taken. So from that point of view it was a thorough success. But our seats at the brass-section end of the front row were not ideal, and while I could appreciate how well everyone was singing and playing — and was heartened to see the standard hadn't slipped one bit — the skewed balance made it hard for me to bask in the glory of it all as completely as I would have liked. And I was still waiting for That Performance.

Which, as I expounded at length, was exactly what came next. No need to repeat all that here, but the crux of it is that here, at performance number five, was where I fell. Actually, no. Not where I fell, but where I realised I had already fallen. I loved it. Not as an idea, or an event, or a vehicle for a favourite singer, but just for itself. More than that, it had become mine. The #donotmissBliss campaign had given me a sense of personal investment in the opera, but that sense of ownership is different, less tangible and more exciting. Without it, I could still have enjoyed my six performances and lavished genuine praise upon Bliss, but with it, well, all that stuff is a lot more fun — and it's the reason this blog post is so unbelievably long. Adoration, as we know, always does make me long-winded. 

And closing night was just beautiful. Not heavy or solemn. In spirit, it was like a three-hour version of Harry's final sonnet — peaceful, radiant, at ease with life and with the eventual end of it. The cast seemed more relaxed than ever, to the point that we even enjoyed the odd, harmless blooper. Peter's Harry seemed warmer and looser-limbed than ever, and in the restaurant, more wonderfully drunk than ever. Later, in the asylum and back at home, there was something eerie about him, a sad, quiet sense of helplessness. He was doing less, it seemed, than he had in previous performances, and once I'd adjusted to that, the effect was unexpectedly poignant. The sonnet itself was some kind of perfect. It was the right way to finish.

Not that it has finished. One season down, two more to go — for this cast — and a second production before the year is out. I hope it won't finish then, either. I want Bliss to live. Not just on principle, although that would be enough, but because I love it. I'm not much interested in whether it's the Great Australian Opera — I'm not even sure such a creature will ever exist, or need to. It's just a really, really good opera and one which deserves a meaningful future. Perfect it ain't, but when the ink dries and the hype settles, I'd like to think we'll come to accept the flaws of this opera as we do those of (let's face it) every single other opera ever written, and let its brilliance flourish. Bliss is a thing of beauty — so let's hope it is indeed a Joy for ever. 

Bliss

Not that I am psychic or anything, but the fact remains that I woke up yesterday morning convinced that the evening's performance of Bliss would be the best yet. Having acquired this habit of seeing entire seasons of things (you know, provided they have a Barker or a Coleman-Wright in them) I've learnt to expect that One Show in which everything is just right — the performance in which everything seems to come together and explode in magnificence, and which maintains a sort of white-hot quality in my memory. Voices flow more freely and are more beautiful than ever, the staging slicker, characterisation at its best and most riveting, orchestra aflame. All those qualities, all at once. 

That was the show I spent most of yesterday expecting, which any law of jinxes will tell you is a very foolish thing to do. I should have spent the day trying to talk myself down. But the conviction remained strong and I even took the rash step of disclosing it on Twitter, for all to see. Wouldn't I have felt silly if the show had been nothing more than very good? Or even if it had been excellent, but only as excellent as all those preceding it.

Well, I don't know how I knew, but I was right. So right it almost hurt. Last night's Bliss was far and away the best of the run so far. It was the one I'd been waiting for, not just since opening night, but since my excitement about the show began, lo these many months ago. And now I'm happier than ever that I held off on the Big Bliss Blog Post, because this is the performance which deserves that kind of documentation. Had I written the long blog review back at the start, it would inevitably have had a sort of anticipatory quality — I would have been trying to express both how I felt then and there, and how I expected I'd feel when it really took flight. Different story now. I'm here not to speculate, but to overflow.

I sensed within a minute that my own crackling excitement was going to be matched. Peter doesn't even sing a note in the first scene, but there was already a freedom and intensity in his performance which boded well, and when he woke up in hospital and sang his first lines, those same qualities came rippling through in his singing as well. I'm not sure when I've heard him in finer voice. He slid between forced jollity and abject fear with touching vulnerability; seemed more alive than ever to the revelations of Betty's New York aria; and when at last the Vision came I knew beyond a doubt we'd arrived at the Night of Nights. 

So there we were in our elevated state and there we stayed; or at least, I certainly did, and the cast and orchestra seemed to as well. In fact it just got better. Every element in place, with the brilliance of each seeming to feed off — and feed into — every other. Dynamite, just like the advance publicity promised, and long before Betty had struck her match. I found myself drawn to the edge of my seat, I found my jaw dropping — cliché after cliché, but all of them true — and I cried more than once, which hasn't happened before in this season. I also just about lost it with laughter during the argument between Harry and Johnny, something which has never happened to me in the Opera Theatre before, though it's happened a few times at the Con. (One of the best things about sitting near the stage for Bliss is getting to hear the ad-libbed insults which Peter and Kanen throw at each other as Johnny chases Harry around the stage. Comedy gold.)

Now I will return to Harry shortly. But it seems a convenient moment to dwell a little longer on the frankly stunning supporting performances in this opera than  in my printed reviews, where word limits obliged me to rush through them in half-sentences so that Peter could have a paragraph. 

I'm not sure I can adequately express the ferocious wonder that is Merlyn Quaife's Betty Joy. Until now I'd known Merlyn only by her formidable reputation and had never heard her sing. Let's just say she lives up to that reputation, and then some. Her role is quite insanely written, really, and yet she tackles it with fearlessness and ruthless agility, and eventually unearths a complexity — beauty, even? — in this hard-to-love woman which makes her hellish end as poignant as it is poetically just. (And may I just say how much I adore the wordless scene in which the police arrive to tell Lucy and David what has happened. Hats were never more movingly removed, nor a revolve more perfectly utilised. Neil Armfield, I love you.)

Lorina Gore is just irresistible as Honey B. She's as loveable as Betty isn't. And while the role might be written around a prettier, sweeter voice, it's still exceptionally challenging in terms of the tessitura and coloratura facility it draws upon. Lorina handles all that gorgeously, though, and last night's was the most gorgeous of all. Her stunning, mezza voce "I don't come from anywhere" was responsible for my first tears of the evening (actually, my first of the season now I think of it), and her "Ah Harry, my Harry" had a rawness and depth of feeling it's not quite reached before. 

I need also to rave about both Taryn Fiebig and David Corcoran. As far as I'm concerned, this is the best thing I've ever seen or heard Taryn do. She is in fabulous voice, she captures both Lucy's schoolgirlishness and her very real pain, and she is utterly heartbreaking in her final confrontation with her father — "Stay! Please! Stay!" — I'm welling up just thinking about it. David, meanwhile, just knocks me over afresh with every performance. The vitality, commitment and tonal brilliance of his singing are very special indeed, and it's really quite strange to see his name in the back of the program as a Young Artist when his artistry seems so fully formed. He is a treasure, and provided the company treats him properly, I think he's just going to keep getting better. I can't say enough in praise of his performance here.

Forgive me if I slip back into one-singer-one-sentence mode now, it's the only way to keep this post from growing longer than Amanda Holden's libretto. I think my first plaudit has to go to Kanen Breen. I love his American accent. It's like listening to a golden-age Broadway musical. (That's praise.) It's also quite honestly some of the most beautiful singing I've ever heard from him: "I am redundant" in particular sits perfectly in his voice. And I think Shane Lowrencev is just quietly pulling off a bit of a tour de force in his three roles, particularly as they're so diverse. He's outstanding (and hilarious) as Reverend Des and one of the policemen, but it's the eerie soulfulness he brings to Nurse which really gets to me, and which makes that my favourite of his roles. Stephen Smith is a delight in his two roles: particularly as the other police officer, with his coloratura flashes and slick, vaguely creepy demeanour. And he does kind of look as if he were born to wear that uniform.

And Barry Ryan! He's just as right as Alex. I love the slightly childish quality he brings to him — you see it when Harry pushes him around in his office chair, during his drunken tantrum at the Hilton, and then above all in the asylum. The Harry/Alex duet is still one of my absolute favourite parts of the opera — last night I was practically dancing in my seat to it — and I also love the way he delivers the lines "It's my punishment...For what we do here." Henry Choo's two roles have both grown on me, but particularly Aldo, the Italian waiter who sings about cancer. I didn't love it the first time, but his little aria has crawled inside my head now and I've changed my mind. There's something somehow spooky about him. 

The all-encompassing fabulousness of last night's performance improved Milijana Nikolic's Mrs Dalton as well, her monologue more intelligible and pointed than ever — and she certainly does cut an extraordinary figure in those heels and that wig. Teresa La Rocca and Jane Parkin are excellent in their very brief appearance as the two nurses (who scope out in minutes all the truths to which Harry has been oblivious for two decades). I'm especially taken with Jane, whose diction and charisma augur very well indeed — can't wait to see her in something more substantial, now that she's a Young Artist. Malcolm Ede is good fun as both Harry's Neighbour and the doctor who comes to take Harry away and ends up with Alex instead. 

About the chorus, all I can do is state the obvious. They're exemplary. Of course they are. That's what they do. They deserve medals for the asylum scene, with extra stars for the boys in the boardroom. Particularly Margaret Plummer for her valiantly loony "O for the wings of a dove" and Sam Roberts-Smith for his fantastic broad accent ("So close to the product!"). The orchestra is magic too, and particularly so last night. We love you, Elgar Howarth. If only this one had been the radio broadcast.

And then there's Peter. From the outset his Harry was an extraordinary creation and has become more so with each performance. Last night, though, was not just the next step in that process. It was beyond that. He took possession of Harry, Harry took possession of him. Every facet of his performance seemed first to fall into place and then to rise up and form something better and fierier than just A Sterling Performance. Magic is what it was, I suppose. This was his funniest, most vivid, most complex, most outrageous and most ultimately moving Harry yet, sung with searing beauty and exquisitely characterised. Unless by some miracle closing night outdoes it — and you never know, it might — this will be the Harry who hangs around in my head for years to come. Pure Joy.

A Night of Eighties Bliss

Thursday evening's performance of Bliss was also the occasion of another much-awaited event, namely The Mad Scene's Eighties Night. It was a brilliant night, during which we not only flaunted our fabulous costumes, but also met both the composer and the leading man. So naturally there are more photos than just the above. I've already posted the album on the Mad Scene profile, but since I know there are some of you who can't (or won't) do Facebook, I've now put them on Flickr as well. You'll find the album here. Enjoy!

Mitigated Bliss

There's been a fair bit of comment around the internets regarding Amanda Holden's libretto for Bliss. More negative than positive, perhaps, but I'd say that's pretty standard for a libretto. If you hate it, you say something. If you like it, it becomes enfolded in the music and you probably don't need to make much comment on it unless pressed. I tend to think unobtrusiveness is just as admirable a quality for a libretto as mindblowing poetry, maybe more so, since it's arguably less subjective.

Anyway, I wouldn't exactly call Amanda Holden's libretto unobtrusive, but I do think that it's very much at the service of music and story, and in that respect, I like it quite a lot. Others have taken issue with the quality of its poetry, but I haven't their concerns. Admittedly, there are some infelicities, but I think these are mostly the product of pounding Carey's vast plotlines into such compact form. Take Harry's and Honey's romance, for instance. A century or two ago, this might have been given the entire opera to develop, and it has  far ampler space in the novel. Here,  though, there's a lot of other stuff going on, and it has to be squeezed into a few quick scenes, which means complex feelings must be voiced in a very concise — and thus potentially rather trite — manner. I don't think "Usually I don't feel a thing, but with you it's different" is a hugely satisfying reduction of Honey's whole complicated awakening by Harry, but what can you do? There's not really room for much more. "Come and find me, I shall be waiting/then life will have meaning" is a bit syrupy for my tastes, too, but it is actually true, and with so little space, telling trumps showing. 

For the most part, though, I like the way Holden has written this libretto. It wouldn't play well as spoken dialogue, but that for me is a point in its favour. A couple of years ago, I spent a lot of time (too much, really) comparing Philip Littell's libretto for Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire with the play. Now there's a libretto that would work as spoken dialogue, because it's basically just an abridged version of the play, with a few long passages worked in to resemble arias. I don't, however, think it sings very well. Amanda Holden's words do sing. They read, even in recitative, like words waiting for music: there's a heightened, poetic and faintly rhythmic quality to even the most mundane utterances, which, while your mileage may well vary, is exactly what I like in a libretto, even a clumsy one. (Which this isn't.)

If I do have a bone to pick, it's not with the style but with the structure. Yet even this feels pretty unfair, because turning this tangled, tangential web of a novel into twelve punchy scenes must have been (sorry) a Hell of a job, and Holden really has done a pretty spectacular job of it. There are just some scenes which I feel suffer from having been so very streamlined, where so much of the novel's background and explanation has been stripped away that the sense of some actions is somewhat lost. There are scenes, and aspects of character, which I have the feeling only make sense to me because I can fill in the gaps from the novel. Alex's secretly rewritten reports, Betty's New York fixation, Harry's "Ballad of Little Titch" — I'm not sure how well I'd process these if I'd come to the opera cold, and I wonder whether some of this stuff (I'm thinking of Titch in particular) might have been retained more for its musical possibilities than its dramatic necessity.

And yet, you know, it's funny. I started this post — and particularly the last paragraph — expecting to ramble on this subject for a while, but as I sit here and go over the opera in my head, and re-read the libretto (huge thumbs up to Opera Australia for including it in the program, by the way), I'm finding less and less to pick at. It ain't flawless, but the longer I sit with it, the smaller its flaws seem. That doesn't mean they should be ignored, and I imagine there's editing to be done before this opera reaches its last-absolutely-the-last-final-full-stop form, but nor are they its undoing. More importantly — and much more subjectively — I'm discovering such affection for this opera that I just can't bring myself to dwell on even reasonable criticisms. There were scenes I had every intention of pulling apart, but doing so means re-living them, and when I do that, it's not the faults but the delights which come back in strongest focus. 

Maybe that's a bit of a cop-out. But it's also, at least within my own little world, a good sign for Bliss. It means I'm getting attached. There aren't many perfect operas, and even the ones you think are perfect have probably been hauled over the coals by somebody else at some point. The real question is whether you treat the imperfections with scorn or affection, irritation or indulgence — and the longer I spend with Bliss, the more irresistibly I veer towards the latter. 

Twice the Bliss

Since I (and the cast, obviously) are only about twelve hours from a third Bliss, I do want to say just a few words about the second. In fact all that really needs to be said is that it did exactly what I had hoped and expected it would, which was to improve and deepen in pretty much every respect. Everything and everyone seemed just a bit freer, more at home, and more alive, which is hardly surprising. (It's also convenient, since this was the one that was filmed and broadcast.) 

As I tweeted at the time, opening night was opening night, but performance #2 was where I think Bliss really began. In particular, Peter Coleman-Wright, extraordinary as he was on opening night, inhabited Harry even more fully — and with even greater warmth — the second time around. My sitting even closer (front row this time) may have helped too. I also found the dramatic progression of it far more satisfying on a second viewing; I felt far less mired in the baggage of the novel, and better able to appreciate the opera as a separate and different creation. It definitely helps to know the contours of the piece as a whole right from the start; one can begin to measure the show against itself, rather than its sources. 

Very much looking forward to tomorrow's matinée. I've started finding myself humming tiny snippets — "you can't beat 'em so join 'em", "Charybdis", "Ah, Harry, my Harry" — which must be a good sign, and which makes me even hungrier to hear the whole thing again. Besides, there are aspects I want to write about, but which need at least one more viewing before I feel I can do so. The libretto, for instance, and Harry himself. And of course, the post I'm having the most difficulty holding back, which is the obligatory Why Peter Coleman-Wright Is So Impossibly Wonderful post. It will come. I'm just collecting as many reasons as possible. See you tomorrow, perhaps.

(PS Note that Pathways to Bliss has been updated with links to the ABC2 broadcast on iView, and to parts 2 and 3 of Kanen Breen's video diary.)

Pazza di Aroldo

People don't really do insertion arias these days, but if Lorina Gore, or any subsequent Honey B, ever feels she'd like something more to sing, I have a suggestion. (The staging's quite well suited too, although the costumes would need to be updated.)
 

Seriously, I'm amazed that not a single review or article about Bliss has worked this song into its headline. 

Pathways to Bliss

OK. After last night's funny little review-that-wasn't, here's something more matter of fact. A Bliss linkfest. I'll try to keep updating and re-posting it as additions surface.

Background | True history of the Bliss gang (The Australian/Matthew Westwood | A Joy in hell as Bliss hits the stage [includes photos & audio] (ABC Local/Matthew Perkins) | A long-delayed Bliss is fulfilled at last (Sydney Morning Herald/Bryce Hallett) |  Blissful awakening (The Age/Michael Shmith) | Opera Australia hopes for happiness (Sydney Morning Herald/Bryce Hallett) | Bliss brings Aussie accent to opera (Nine News/Alyssa Braithwaite) | Opera-lovers embrace tree-hugger [includes video] (The Australian/Matthew Westwood 

Interviews | Brett Dean on the Music Show  [radio]| Brett Dean with Margaret Throsby [radio] | Brett Dean with David Allenby [print] | Brett Dean with Time Out Sydney | Peter Coleman-Wright on the Music Show [radio] | Brett Dean, Neil Armfield, Peter Coleman-Wright, David Corcoran and Alice Babidge, all in Allerta! | Barry Ryan with me [right here on this blog]

Reviews | Blissful performances on anti-hero's journey (Sydney Morning Herald/Peter McCallum) | Compelling mutation of a Peter Carey masterwork (The Australian/Murray Black) | Long live Bliss - a joy forever (The Age/Michael Shmith) | Bliss (The Stage/Jeremy Eccles) | Bliss has the potential to go far (The Opera Critic/Yours truly) | Bliss - Opera Australia (Adelaide Now/Peter Burdon)

Photos | Photo essays by Bridget Elliot (Australian Music Centre) | Sydney Morning Herald | AAP Image 

Video | Kanen Breen's rehearsal video diary Part One, Part Two, Part Three | Taryn Fiebig | ABC News | Hitler Misses Bliss | And the ABC2 broadcast is available in full on iView until the end of the month.

Social networking | The #donotmissBliss Twitter campaign continues | Lots of discussion happening at The Mad Scene | Not to mention Eighties Night! | And oh dear ... look who's inspired a Facebook fan group

Meta-Bliss

It's fair to say I will never be Peter McCallum. Peter McCallum, who not only wrestles the hugeness of the Bliss experience into 472 words, but does so quickly enough for the review to appear within 12 hours of the standing ovations it recounts. Speed and conciseness, funnily enough, were my claims to fame during high school and university. Nowadays, though, when I'm writing about opera, instead of thrusting a Marxist analysis upon poor Heathcliff (not my idea) or working Catherine Deneuve into yet another French writing assignment (that was my idea), everything seems to stretch out and complicate itself. 

The first person pronoun may never make an appearance, but my reviews are nevertheless very personal pieces of writing, and as such, much harder than academic discussion to extract from my temple and arrange on the virtual page. I always hope that while I sleep, elves will do the work for me, but this never happens. It is always a challenge. 

And the greater the experience, the greater the challenge, which is why reviewing Bliss this weekend proved somewhat harrowing. Normal sleep patterns were abandoned, copious Coke Zero was consumed, frustration at the futility of words in the face of music was expressed on several occasions, and the passive voice, as you see, was not always conquered. In the end, I got there. I inevitably do, but at the outset — as I stare at the screen, hoping to snatch from the air an introductory thought with paragraph potential — completion doesn't feel very inevitable at all.

Why I am I telling you all this? I'm telling you because, having just drained myself of description, praise and analysis for this strange and wonderful work with which I might just be falling in love, there's no way I can do it again so soon — and even if I were up to it, I don't think it's the best idea. I'm about to go on a journey with Bliss. I've booked for every performance. And since I've almost never attended a second — or tenth — performance of any opera without wishing to amend my initial review, it's reasonable to assume that Bliss, which is so new, so toweringly complex and which has so many directions in which to develop, will elicit a fair few words from me over the next three weeks.

So that's how I'm going to blog Bliss. Not as one big capital-R Review, trailing addenda, but as all the words — however long, and whatever their shape — this season sends spinning out of me. I hope you'll join me for the ride, both here in computerland and above all in the theatre. To quote  Amanda Holden's libretto, there is massive turbulence ahead. But it's gorgeous, thrilling turbulence, and I plan to revel in its every tremor. If I can't do that in 472 words, then so be it.

The beginning

It is easy to think of tonight's world première of Bliss as a sort of finishing line now crossed. For ten years the opera has been inching its way toward this very point, and now, at last, here it is. Mission accomplished. Except not. The gestation might be over with, but that's only one phase of existence anyway. Now this fascinating operatic baby has been born, and what we have is not an end, but a beginning. 

And as beginnings go, this was an auspicious one. Brett Dean's first opera is rich, complex, mesmerising, intriguing and downright beautiful. (Conventional and unconventional beauty shoulder to shoulder.) The creative forces assembled to bring it to life all live up to their formidable reputations. Artistry, bravery, imagination, affection and wit abound. 

Is it fully formed and perfectly polished yet? No. Is that a problem? Absolutely not. It's a privilege for us to see that formation happen before our eyes — to watch our newborn opera take its first steps and carve out its own very special life. Bliss as it was tonight was a strong and beautiful thing; the Bliss which will grow through this season, and another, and another,  and so on and so on, will be stronger and more beautiful still. I've booked for every Sydney performance, and I can't wait to see where this season goes, and where it takes me.

As for the specifics of tonight's performance, well, now is not the time. They'll come, thick, fast and florid, both here and in my published reviews. All I'll say right now, because it cannot go another minute unsaid, is that Peter Coleman-Wright has achieved — is achieving — something extraordinary as Harry Joy. He is the mad, virtuosic, yet disarmingly self-effacing centre of everything, and his voice and presence are just as luminous as his white suits. 

It's been tweeted so often that maybe it's lost its lustre, but after tonight, it holds truer than ever. Do not miss Bliss. 

Barry on Bliss

Baritone Barry Ryan sings the role of Alex Duval in Brett Dean's Bliss, which as we are all no doubt keenly aware, opens at the Sydney Opera House tomorrow night. He very kindly took the time to answer a few questions about his part in this unmissable (#donotmissBliss!) operatic event. 

Barry Ryan as Alex Duval in Bliss. (Photo: Branco Gaica)

How long ago did you become involved with Bliss? Were you a part of the workshopping process or did you come on board once the opera was fully formed?

I came on board about halfway though the process, after the initial workshop had been done but before it got fully underway.

 Everyone seems to agree that Brett Dean's music for Bliss is fairly challenging. How did you go about learning the role? Are there particular vocal challenges in Brett's writing for Alex? 

With any modern work there are challenges, mainly because nobody’s done the work before and there’s nothing for us to use as a point of reference. With traditional repertoire there are recordings, DVDs, etc from which you can select aspects of a performance and character that appeal, and work from there in developing your own approach. So this has been ground breaking in that way, working without a precedent.

The role is very vocally challenging, and incredibly high for a lyric baritone. However as I’ve sung tenor before, this helped. There are a lot of top A naturals in the duet with Peter Coleman-Wright, which you would not usually find in the repertoire for a lyric baritone. So this was one of the big challenges.

My preparation has been really just about practising hard, trying things out and finding what works and what doesn’t. For example, I’d play around with my vowel sounds to find out what needs to be in the phrase before the really high notes, to help me get there. So it’s really ‘trial and error’, but very exciting discovering new ways of doing things!

For those who might be unfamiliar with the novel, can you tell us a bit about the character of Alex Duval, and how he fits into Harry Joy's saga? 

Alex is one of Harry’s friends – well, as much of a ‘friend’ as Harry has, as I don’t think he really has real, close friends. He’s a colleague, someone with whom he has mutual respect. A lot of respect really, to the point where he undergoes a metamorphosis and thinks he is Harry. I see him as slightly sycophantic to Harry – he puts him on a pedestal but when Harry starts to undergo drastic changes of his own, Alex is shocked and thrown by these.

Alex is an unusual character and not the most immediately sympathetic. What is he like to play? Is that where Neil Armfield comes in? 

Neil’s effect on a production and a character is really unique. I’ve worked with him several times and he’s a fantastic director. He doesn’t force you to do your role in a way that’s not already in you – he can see the essence of the character in you and then he tries to draw out. With a minimum of fuss too – in fact you don’t know its happening but then you think "hang on a minute I didn’t realize I was going this way" but you realize Neil has drawn something out of you that you didn’t even realize was there. He helps you find the character within you, rather than form it.

This isn't your first time premiering a new Australian work. Is there a particular approach you take to preparing for a work like this, as opposed to an established repertory piece?

Having no point of reference, you’re really inventing everything for the first time – it’s exciting and pretty bloody scary! Because you’re also conscious that when people do it again, they will use your own performance as their point of reference – and they might think it’s awful! But that’s the major difference -  inventing new a character, a new vocal perspective for the character.

Bliss has been a long time in the making. Are there specific pressures that come with finally bringing such a long-awaited work to the stage? What has the atmosphere in rehearsals been like, particularly as opening night draws nearer?

Absolutely there are big pressures. There is a global expectation - not just an Australian one – for Bliss to be big and we’ve really all felt that. There’s already the Edinburgh Festival ahead, and then the Hamburg production, so it’s a  hell of a pressure on everyone, but especially Brett and Amanda. 

In a way, I feel we’re responsible for delivering Brett’s baby! I feel deeply I want to do my best for my own sense of achievement, of course, but I really want it to be a great success for HIM too. After the dress rehearsal he looked so elated, like he was thinking “wow this is going to work, and these guys can actually do this"! I saw the same look on his face after the initial vocal workshops, but once we put the books away we had to start again from scratch, and I’m sure at one point he must have wondered if it would really come together as well as he’d hoped. But after the final rehearsal, he knew we had it, and he had that happy look again!

A lot of new operas, in Australia and overseas, seem to disappear after they're premiered – it's hard for a new work to really take permanent hold in the repertoire. What are your hopes/predictions for the future of Bliss?

My hopes are of course that it will go on to be performed at The Met and Vienna etc. I don’t think it’s impossible, but with modern works you just never know. With Batavia there were rumours of it going global, and that hasn’t yet come to fruition, though it deserves to. But I think with Brett’s reputation in Europe, the possibilities are huge. I think it will be a great success here, and I hope for big things internationally, but as for predictions, we’ll have to wait and see.

 Barry Ryan & Peter Coleman-Wright (Harry Joy) in Bliss. (Photo: Branco Gaica) 

#donotmissBliss: The Downfall Parody

Once I'd had the idea, I couldn't shake it. So here it is. (And if you're not familiar with the [slightly passé] phenomenon of the Downfall parody, here's a bit of background.) 

The Rise and Rise of #donotmissBliss

I love social networking. A week ago, @ElissaMilne and I started up the #donotmissBliss tag, and the mania just keeps on spreading. We haven't trended yet but all things considered, I think our humble hashtag is doing pretty darn well for itself. 

So I was especially thrilled on Tuesday to discover that Opera Australia (in the form of @OAPR) had come on board with the campaign — not just by using the tag, but by actually running a competition encouraging others to do likewise. Have a look at the @OAPR profile and you'll see the details — there's a double pass to Bliss up for grabs every day for a week. 

I'm so glad that OA is finally making a proper splash on Twitter, and of course very happy to have contributed to that splash. Even if sometimes I think I should also be tagging my tweets with #stillnotonthepayroll. (I kid. Labour of love, goodness of my heart, etc etc.)

And meanwhile, Bliss and #donotmissBliss seem to be bringing out the artist in everyone. First there was Alex's poem, and now another friend of mine — known to you as the creator of John Wegner is awesome and of the Bliss Pie — has also been moved to burst into verse. Here's her #donotmissBliss limerick:

I'm not OA's new ticket flogger
But this serves as a memory jogger:
    I'll remind you of this --
    Please #donotmissBliss
(And so agrees prima-* the blogger.)

[*lamusica. But then it wouldn't scan.]

To which I can add nothing but my agreement. Do not miss Bliss.

Blissmania!

Bliss! It's a multimedia sensation! You know about Bliss, the novel and Bliss the film, and of course you know about Bliss, the opera. But do you know about...

...Bliss, the Twitter hashtag
It all started with @ElissaMilne, who thought my tweet about my opening night dress meant the opera had already opened. Panicking, she tagged her tweet with "#donotmissBliss". I said it deserved to be a trending topic, and a campaign was born. A number of us are now using this hashtag as frequently (and creatively!) as we can. We haven't got it trending yet but we're having a brilliant time trying, so if you're the tweeting type, please join in. Brainless memes and Justin Bieber (who?) are hard to displace, it's true, but how thrilling would it be if we actually made it happen? And even if we don't trend, I'm sure you'll agree that encouraging people not to miss Bliss is a massively worthy aim. 

...Bliss, the orchestral suite
I've linked to this before, but it bears repeating. You can listen online here to Brett Dean's Moments of Bliss, an orchestral suite drawn from the opera. At the Bliss symposium last Sunday, Brett said that while the suite doesn't necessarily appear in "great slabs", almost every bar of it has made it into the finished opera — so it's a nice way to whet your appetite.

...Bliss, the radio interview
Andrew Ford's very recent interview with Peter Coleman-Wright is a very engaging introduction to both the plot and the music of Bliss. It also includes a snippet of Moments, but perhaps even more interesting is the brief snippet included from Songs of Joy, in which we hear Harry Joy describing his vision of Heaven and Hell. Check out that falsetto!

...Bliss, the poem
Alex, proprietrix of The View From C Reserve, has written a marvellous poem in support of the above-mentioned Twitter campaign. With her permission, I reproduce it here: 

I don't have Twitter, but for crying out loud
#DONOTMISSBLISS!

If you miss Bliss,
You'll be seriously pissed,
And you'll boo and you'll hiss,
"What the hell is with this?"

Don't go get on the piss,
Get an earful of dis,
Go and BOOK NOW FOR BLISS:
Pete'll blow you a kiss.

It is not to be missed.
So, we'll see you at Bliss?

You can see why I've dubbed Alex The Mad Scene's Poet Laureate. (She's also just written a Peter CW inspired haiku which I absolutely love.)

...Bliss, the menu item
Maybe I shouldn't even admit to this one. A friend (and the creator of John Wegner is awesome, as it happens) came over on Friday night, bearing pie. The pie was compensation for the hideous movie we were then obliged to watch. But she asked me beforehand what picture I'd like onto the top of the pie, and naturally, since my mind has only one track, I said "Bliss!" Thus, The Bliss Pie. (Yes, it took me a moment too. But that's an elephant sitting on a car, with three honey bees hovering overhead.)

...Bliss, the costume party
I've already mentioned this, too, but let me encourage you yet again to dress up and come along to Bliss Eighties Night on March 25th. Come even if you don't want to dress up, it looks like being a very fun evening. 

...Bliss, the documentary
The ABC's Artscape will screen a documentary on March 16th entitled Making Opera Bliss, offering a behind-the-scenes process of this world premiere. Indeed, the documentary forms part of what they're calling a "Bliss-a-thon", allowing viewers to explore "the book, the film and finally the opera...on ABC1, ABC2 and the Arts Gateway".

...Bliss, the TV/cinema broadcast
Said Bliss-a-thon culminates in the live TV and cinema broadcast of Bliss on March 17th. If you can't be in the house (which is where I'll be!) then somewhere, somehow, there is a screen you can watch it on. And watch it you must. You don't need me to tell you that. 

...Bliss, the unmissable opera
This is what all the above, however loopy, comes down to — you have to go. Bliss is a significant happening in all kinds of ways. And besides, it's packed with such potential for wonderfulness — just look at the artistic forces involved! — that you'd have to be crazier than Harry at his craziest not to experience it for yourself. Once at least, and more if you can. Do not miss Bliss. And spread the word: #donotmissBliss.

Bliss & Madness

One of the reasons we started The Mad Scene in the first place was to encourage themed costume nights at the opera — it's the sort of lunacy which works better in groups. So, now that the group is going strong (159 members and counting — will you be #160?) we've announced the first such evening. It's A Night of Eighties Bliss, a chance to don your best shoulder pads and sequins in honour of Brett Dean's Bliss. 

In theory it's a Mad Scene event, but since I know not all of you are Facebookishly inclined, consider this your invitation. Thursday 25th March is the date for your diary. We're not organising a group booking or anything like that, but it's worth noting that there are a lot of seats left for that performance in all reserves of Rows A-D. That's where my co-admin Simon and I will be, as well as at least a few other Mad Sceners, and we'd love for as many people as possible to join us — the more the merrier. 

And if you are Facebookishly inclined, you'll find all the event details here. We'll organise pre-show and interval gatherings closer to the night, so keep an eye on that page for further information. We'd appreciate it if you RSVP, too; it doesn't oblige you to come, but it does at least give us a rough idea of who to expect. 

2009 in review: Opera Australia

This would usually be the post in which I handed out various laurels to the best of the past year's Opera Australia season. The problem is that this year, all of those laurels would just have to go to Peter Grimes, wouldn't they? It was truly the best of everything. So I'm opting instead for a more inclusive (and, typically, more longwinded) approach.

Here are Fifty-Two Things I Loved at Opera Australia in 2009.

1. The chance to see Moffat Oxenbould's exquisite production of Madama Butterfly live in the theatre, and with the soprano for whom it was created in the title role. I could see those petals fall a hundred times and the magic wouldn't fade.

2. The palpable electricity of Cheryl Barker's final Butterfly of the season, a stunning and maybe paradoxical combination of utter abandon and gorgeous refinement. 

3. Antoinette Halloran's short notice triumph in the same role when Cheryl cancelled what turned out to be the first of three performances. Her standing ovation came a little later in the run but she deserved it for that first performance.

4. The spontaneous (and unanimous) standing ovation for Cheryl's second Butterfly. Yes, it can probably be explained by the high proportion of tourists in the audience that night, but it was still a great thing to see. 

5. The last of Cheryl's January Butterflies, before she adjourned to Paris and Antoinette officially took over. She had cancelled three times, my poor nerves were shattered; but at last, she was back, and with the considerable bonus of Jacqui Dark, filling in for Catherine Carby as Suzuki. 

6. Jonathan Summers's two fabulous entrances in Cav/Pag, first as a Mafioso Alfio and then, even better, as a haunting and darkly comedic Tonio. I didn't exactly love this double bill, but I swear there's no production so dire it can't be immediately improved by the presence of Jonathan Summers.

7. José Carbo's beautiful (but of course, much too short) appearance as Pagliacci's Silvio. I tell you, if there's one thing this season needed, it was more José. 

8. And again, from Pagliacci, Stephen Smith's strong cameo as Beppe, the first of his many bit parts in this season and an auspicious introduction.

9. Fine, one from Cavalleria Rusticana. Dominica Matthews's surprisingly convincing Lola. I wouldn't have picked Dominica for verismo repertoire and yet she absolutely made it work.

10. Emma Pearson's suitably ferocious Queen of the Night. I tried to see her a second time but (sigh) she was indisposed. So please, please, Opera Australia, bring her back soon.

11. Two lovely Paminas in Emma Matthews and Hye Seoung Kwon, each of whom brought her own brand of prettiness to the role. Objectively, I'd give Emma the victory; subjectively speaking, I preferred Hye Seoung's voice in the role.

12. Andrew Moran as a very funny Aussie Papageno. Warwick Fyfe did a fine job in the role but somehow Andrew was even more hilarious, and I'm more enamoured of his voice every time I hear it.

13. The privilege of a true dramatic soprano in our midst, in the form of Susan Bullock, a sensational Katerina in Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. 

14. All the seedy and confronting glory of aforementioned Lady M and of Francesca Zambello's excellent production. I'm still kicking myself for not making it to a second performance. 

15. Jacqui Dark's rather brave performance as Aksinya in the opera's infamous "barrel scene".

16. The overpowering sound of the AOBO as, under the leadership of Sir Richard Armstrong, it tore into Shostakovich's blazing score. Loudness of the best sort. 

17. And, of course, the very successful company début of my compatriot, heldentenor Simon O'Neill as a thoroughly slapworthy (but magnificently sung) Sergei.

18. The opportunity to finally express admiration for Elke Neidhardt. She and I have not had the best history, but I thought her work as revival director of the Moshinsky production of Werther was just superb. Loved the costumes, too. 

19. The eternally swoonworthy voice of Aldo Di Toro as the lovelorn Werther. 

20. The delightful surprise of Sarah Crane's sparkling Sophie. I adored her (and her character, who should have annoyed me) and I'm rather upset at her absence from the 2010 season. I hope she's back in 2011.

21. In a rather, shall we say, uneven production of Acis and Galatea, Shane Lowrencev's towering, raging and hilariously insatiable Polyphemus. His "O ruddier than the cherry" was my favourite part of the opera. 

22. Over the top though it may have been, Patrick Nolan's staging of Damon's "Shepherd, what art thou pursuing?" in said Acis, which piled in almost everything a director could do to outrage the easily outraged. 

23. The virtuosic grotesquerie of Kanen Breen's Sorceress in Dido and Aeneas, one of the best (and downright weirdest) performances I've seen from him.

24. Yvonne Kenny's devastating final Dido, which far outdid the other three I saw and included the most moving rendition of "When I am laid in earth" I've ever experienced. 

25. Tamara Wilson's sweet and finely wrought Aida, proof that you don't need to blast the roof off to be an idiomatic and effective Verdi soprano.

26. And speaking of idiomatic: Michael Lewis's excellent Amonasro. There's a man with Verdi in his blood. 

27. Graeme Murphy's staging of the final act of Aida. I wasn't very taken with the first half of this production, but the clearer the stage became, the better it worked, and the tomb scene was really very striking. 

28. David Parkin's return to the opera theatre stage, his first OA performance since he appeared as Sparafucile after winning Operatunity Oz. It's great to see that for once, the winner of a TV talent show has turned out to be absolutely the genuine article. 

29. The night when Cheryl Barker altered the staging of Manon Lescaut's "Sola, perduta, abbandonata", and then every subsequent performance she gave of it. Flawed opera, very flawed heroine, but that final scene had a raw truth to it which was heart stopping.

30. The delectable misbehaviour of Cheryl's Manon in her gilded second act: her playful trills, the spitefully held high note, eight gorgeous renditions of "In quelle trine morbide", the fabulous frock, eight different ways of enunciating "E il busto?", the look on her face when caught in the act of fleeing with her lover and the jewels. 

31. Just surrending to Cheryl's unparalleled ability to make me fall hopelessly in love with a character I thought I didn't like.

32. For good measure, two very fine tenors. Stephen Smith's Harlequin-esque Edmondo, and Jorge Lopez-Yanez's ardent Des Grieux. 

33. The total revelation that was Fidelio. Not that I was expecting to dislike it; but I never expected to love it so much. Opening night was one of the best nights I had in the opera theatre all year. 

34. Speaking of revelations and Fidelio, Peter Coleman-Wright's magnificently villainous Don Pizarro. I never knew he could be so evil, but he absolutely was, from his terrifying "Ha, welch' ein Augenblick" to the fabulous swirl of his cape when he took his final bow. 

35. Best of all, though, Lorina Gore's perfect (there's no other word!) Marzelline. I knew I liked Lorina, but it was this performance which turned me into a bona fide fan and raised my hopes for her future sky high. 

36. Still with Fidelio, Cathy Dadd's direction of this revival. It's a pretty traditional, straightforward production; a lesser talent might have fallen asleep at the wheel, but Dadd kept the show as vivid and compelling as could be. 

37. My Emma Matthews epiphany, which was sparked by her new CD but consolidated by her exquisite Giulietta in I Capuleti e i Montecchi. It turned out she'd been ill and apparently not at her best on opening night, but I must have had my diva goggles (or auditory equivalent) on because I loved her. 

38. Aldo Di Toro's return as Tebaldo, after missing opening night. A surprisingly three-dimensional characterisation and, of course, sublimely sung. Can't wait for his Elvino in Sonnambula. 

39. And yes, believe it or not, Orpha Phelan's rather bleak and jagged production of Capuleti. I might be in the minority but I liked it a lot. It might not have been visually beautiful, but in its own jagged way, it seemed to highlight the beauty of the score.

40. Anthony Warlow's Ko-Ko in The Mikado. Despite all my arms-folded resistance to the supposed charms of Gilbert and Sullivan, I couldn't help but warm to him. I know others thought much less of him, but ever contrary, I finally began to understand his appeal.

41. Warwick Fyfe's revelatory Poo-Bah. Hands down the most impressive thing I've seen him do, and I don't mean that as faint praise. He was completely ideal for the role, both vocally and temperamentally. I was terribly impressed. 

42. The high camp of Kanen Breen's Nanki-Poo. It's always fun seeing Kanen in a role where he gets to show off his gift for physical comedy.

43. Jim Sharman's delightful framing device for his production of Cosi fan tutte, the Japanese wedding. I especially liked the immaculately pair of wedding planners; having the newlyweds dance during "Soave sia il vento" was also a lovely touch. 

44. And, of course, the colour co-ordinated confetti.

45. Rachelle Durkin's simple, sincere and very touching "Per pietà". 

46. Tiffany Speight's show stealing striptease for Despina's "Una donna". I'm still keen to hear Tiffany in a less soubrettish role, but in the meantime, she's a pretty amazing maid. 

47. Neil Armfield's and Peter Carroll's extraordinary conception and expansion of the role of Dr Crabbe in Peter Grimes. 

48. David Corcoran's fantastically well sung Bob Boles. Another burgeoning star for whom I have very high hopes.

49. The succession of jaw-dropping moments which was opening night of Grimes. 

50. The unique spirit which developed among the audiences for Grimes, a sort of solidarity and fraternal feeling borne of an extraordinary shared experience. I've never felt anything like it and for all I know, I may never feel it again.

51. Similarly, the way in which we all responded to that experience, both in conversation and in writing; the speechlessness which turned into an inability to stop talking about it. Very few productions, after all, could produce a collective response quite like this. 

52. The darkened pit.

And now that that's all done and dusted, here are the Peter Grimes laurels. 

My soprano of the year is Susan Gritton. I've heard Susan in various repertoire over the years and generally quite liked her, but her Ellen Orford flicked a switch. She was shattering and sublime in that role, and now with every single piece of music I hear her sing, I fall in love all over again. There's no question that we have the late Richard Hickox to thank for her presence in Grimes, and she's truly one of the most precious gifts he left us. I hope and pray we'll see her back here one day.

My baritone of the year is of course Peter Coleman-Wright, and I also want to name him as my revelation of the year. Maybe that's a strange thing to say about a singer I've been listening to on a daily basis for a couple of years, but this was the year in which he won my devotion in his own right, and not just by association. Plus, his Balstrode was just astonishingly beautiful. I'll never forget the way he fidgeted with suppressed rage as the villagers closed in on Ellen, or the look he threw her as he joined the mob on their way to the hut, or the sublime way he sang in that third act scene. And so many more moments, but I should stop.

Naturally Mark Wigglesworth, Neil Armfield, Ralph Myers and Damien Cooper all take out their respective categories. I've never witnessed such a powerful and triumphant creative collaboration, and people who have been attending OA performances for decades longer than I have have said the same thing. Every facet of Grimes was just so right, from the pit to the stage to the morning sun coming through the skylights. I wish I could say more but, well, see #51 above — it's either astonished silence or endless praise.

So I come to my tenor of the year and, more importantly, my singer of the year. Who else could it be but Stuart Skelton? I had started anticipating his Grimes before it was even announced. Then he sang it in London and the critics (and audiences) went crazy. And finally, here he was in Sydney and he exceeded every expectations. I've been over this before, and since there are only so many ways to put it, I won't repeat myself too much now. But Stuart's Grimes was a treasure, a terror and, I think, a life-altering experience. I shan't ever forget it, and I know for a fact I'm far from alone in that. 

L'Elisir Redux

Funny how things come full circle. I still remember the afternoon, almost four years ago, when I listened to a Met broadcast of L'Elisir d'Amore. It was actually sunny enough to sit outside — rare for a Dunedin summer — so I moved the speakers near to an open window and listened from the verandah. Well, until I got sick of the port wind trying to blow my libretto. I blogged about it, too — said all sort of things — and then that was that, and I doubt it even crossed my mind that I might one day be moved to revisit either my blogged opinions or the performance itself. 

But here I am doing just that, and goodness me, how things have changed. In 2006, I had yet to properly connect with the world of the male voice. I was better with them than I had been, but nevertheless, the most fabulous tenor in the world couldn't move me like even a decent soprano could, and baritones? Forget it. In 2009, I acquired (let's not dwell on how) this recording of L'Elisir because — are you ready? — I wanted to hear the Belcore. Never mind that when I heard it back then, I dismissed this Belcore as "a bit stiff for me" and more or less left it there, pausing only to wonder why the name of this baritone from Geelong seemed so familiar. 

I never did figure that out, but perhaps it was a rift in the space-time continuum — because of course, the Belcore was Peter Coleman-Wright, and these days, well, I'm a bit of a fan. Enough of a fan to go trawling for faintly illicit Donizetti, apparently; this is what his Pizarro, Balstrode and Mahler have done to me. Besides which, baritones generally are just far more my cup of tea than they used to be, so that a character who once seemed a bit of a necessary evil (give Gianetta more to sing, she whined) becomes a source of positive pleasure. And so he is. To be fair, Peter's Belcore still sounds more or less as I remembered; but my response is different. "A bit stiff"? Well, yes, perhaps, but appealingly so; and it's also a funny and strongly sung performance. That's probably helped by my now having some sense of his stage presence, but in any case, he's a delight, and I'm so very happy I had the chance to come back and give him another go.

This, however, was only the start of my little voyage of rediscovery. (He is only a baritone after all.) Then and now, it's the beautiful Ruth Ann Swenson who is the heart of this Elisir — and whatever my initial motivation for listening, with her very first note (which precedes Belcore's) she became my primary and happiest focus. Ruth Ann, Ruth Ann, Ruth Ann. It seems impossible I should forget how lovely she is, and yet I must have, just a little, because her Adina still managed to take me by surprise. Back in 2006 I was quite subdued about her. I described her voice as "an old friend". I said — oh dear — "Ruth Ann has never been a knee-weakening passion for me, but all the same I've had a calm and abiding affection for her for years." And, even worse, "I'm never destined to rave about Ruth Ann as I might (and have) about some others..."

Wrong, wrong and wrong. Well, not entirely. Her voice is an old friend to me. But all this "calm and abiding" stuff doesn't do her justice. I adore Ruth Ann. And I am entirely prepared to rave about her as I might (and have) about some others. Ruth Ann Swenson is a drop dead gorgeous soprano. I've loved her since before I loved opera and I don't intend ever to stop. She is sweet, stylish and heavenly to behold. I've now had the privilege to hear her in person, and she enchanted me all over again — so much so that I'll confess now what I might not have before, which is that, despite seeing Natalie's Lucia twice on the same trip, it was Ruth Ann's Ginevra which gave me the greatest pleasure during my time in San Francisco. I think four years ago I was ill-equipped (in terms both of my own faculties and of the stereo equipment at my disposal) to appreciate just how delicate and ideal Ruth Ann's Adina was. An object lesson in bel canto style, and a lesson in the unlearnable art of charm. Resist her, I dare you. You can't. She's irresistible, and so are those pearly high notes. 

There are more words to eat, or at least to nibble at. My three-sentence flurry of enthusiasm for Ramon Vargas was not unwarranted — he's a very good Nemorino — but at the same time, I can't help thinking what I wrote was more wishful thinking than anything else. If I wrote as if susceptible to the charms of tenors, perhaps I'd become so. It didn't work out that way, and even now that I am susceptible, Vargas does not exactly loom large in my world of devotion. Whereas the other "Mexican RV tenor" whom I implicitly dismissed definitely does; for all his current difficulties, I remain very fond of Rolando Villazon. I also did my best to damn the opera itself with faint praise, but this time around, I felt quite differently — I was struck by just how full of colour and life L'Elisir d'Amore is, by what a tuneful and utterly likeable opera it is. I still have issues with Don Pasquale (I can't quite get past the inherent cruelty of its premise) but I'm re-adjusting my feelings about L'Elisir now, having just had so much fun with it.

The moral of the story? There isn't one especially. I just find it intriguing to see how things change (and how other things remain constant). And don't worry, I don't intend to start revisiting and rethinking every single post in my archives. It was interesting to do so this once, though; after all, one of the reasons I'm pleased I have this blog is the opportunity it affords to remind myself of how I once thought — I tend to forget old opinions once they're replaced. Part of me wants to point at my former self and mock; but it's also heartening to feel that my appreciation of this multifarious world really has deepened and expanded in the last half-decade — despite my propensity to be waylaid by singular fixation. 

Is that a bit too deep and meaningful for a post about L'Elisir d'Amore and how I feel even sillier about Ruth Ann Swenson than I did a few years ago? Probably. Well, never mind. The main thing is that I got to listen to a totally delightful performance of L'Elisir — my little exercise in compare-and-contrast just added to the fun. 

Enchanted evening

Search engine serendipity is a dangerous and beautiful thing. I wasn't looking for travel suggestions. It was just that I got to thinking one evening, a month or so ago, about Peter Coleman-Wright and Mahler's Rückert-Lieder. He sang them in the Netherlands earlier this year, a fact which did register with me at the time; but it wasn't until much more recently — under the combined influence of his magical performances in Peter Grimes, my own growing obsession with the songs themselves, and the fact of both Peter and Cheryl having chosen recordings of "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen" for play during separate radio interviews — that I began to realise that this was something I wished quite desperately to hear. So I ventured into internetland with the faint hope that that April concert might have been preserved on record somehow, and promptly stumbled upon Ensemble Liaison's 2009 calendar, which listed a concert in which the group would, among other things, accompany Peter Coleman-Wright in a chamber arrangement of the Rückert-Lieder. In Melbourne.

My first, sensible thought was "No, I really mustn't." Ha. You'd think I'd know myself better than that by now, wouldn't you? And yet I managed to spend a good half hour convinced that I couldn't possibly, until finally I made that short, obvious and joyful leap to "Yes, I absolutely must", and that was that. Now I'm amazed I even hesitated for that long. If it had been any other repertoire, then perhaps I could have resisted. But I could think of no better hands in which to place the responsibility of my first live Rückert-Lieder, so I booked, and as a result, spent Thursday evening swooning in Federation Square.

For a start, the venue was fantastic, suitably intimate, and all glassed in so that you could look out to the river — and the sunset — behind the performers. It's quite something to see the backdrop change of its own accord like that: we had Mendelssohn by daylight, Schubert's "Notturno" by twilight, and by the time we reached "Um Mitternacht", night had obligingly fallen. The audience behaved beautifully, too — not a cough to be heard (I stifled my own at one point, quite traumatically) and barely any muttering. There was free wine to be had before, during intermission and afterwards, and a competition running to win even more of it. Clarinettist David Griffiths' informal introductions to the pieces were both charming and hilarious. 

Forgive me as I gloss over the purely instrumental portions of the program. It isn't any sort of slight. They were lovely. The "Notturno" was quite mesmerising, and Griffiths's star turn in Brahms's second Clarinet Sonata was a joy to behold. The Mendelssohn Konzertstück which opened the program was quite entertaining, as was the story about dumplings which preceded it. These performances deserve more words, I know; but true to form, I'm saving all my words for the singer.

Both Ensemble Liaison's website and Ticketmaster promised a bracket of Liszt songs as well as the Mahler. This was already a mouthwatering prospect, but imagine my happiness when I picked up a program and discovered that Liszt was out and Richard Strauss was in. I'm sure my stars were in alignment — not one, but two (or one might even say three) musical obsessions in a single recital. Better still, the Strauss bracket began with "Cäcilie", a song I adore, and which Peter delivered with all the irresistible ardour I could have wished for. Bliss enough on its own, really, and yet the three songs which followed were somehow lovelier still. One needed neither printed translations nor any German vocabulary (even though I was equipped with both) to grasp the varied facets of love which these four songs depicted. Every subtlety was ingrained in that incandescent voice and written on his face. There were phrases in the middle two ("Breit, über mein Kopf" and "Schön sind, doch kalt") which seemed to flow silkily on and on, as if he never breathed at all — or was that me not breathing? Hard to believe this was the same language that, just a few months ago, he spat out so venomously as Beethoven's Don Pizarro; now those same Germanic syllables were all tenderness, all velvety warmth, and then, in "Nichts", all ringing jollity and good humour. My Strauss obsession and my soprano obsession go hand in hand, and understandably so, but if I needed proof that Straussian gorgeousness exists beyond the treble clef — this was it. (And then the encore — which nearly didn't happen, but we clapped loudly and made it happen — was "Zueignung", which I love even more than "Cäcilie" and in fact possibly more than any other Strauss song except "Allerseelen", "Morgen" and the Four Last. Sigh and double sigh.)

Brahms, interval and Schubert intervened, and then it was Mahler time. What can I say? To have songs to which I'm so attached in a sense introduced to me by a singer who also means a lot to me is an amazing experience — rather like having had my first and second live Four Last Songs sung by Yvonne Kenny and Cheryl Barker respectively. I could not have asked for a more heavenly introduction. Peter sang and I floated. He mingled radiant introspection with vivid expressivity, his interpretations imbued with a depth and vulnerability which were completely captivating. The soft sweetness of "Ich atmet' einen linden Duft", the exultation of "Liebst du um Schönheit", the electricity of "Um Mitternacht", all these were realised with sincerity and amber-veined lyricism. "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen" is a song I've recently come to think of as quite simply the most beautiful song ever written, a conviction which Peter's searching and sublime rendition did nothing to shake. He gave these five extraordinary songs exactly the treatment they deserved: no trickery, no fuss —  just open-hearted, sensitive and desperately beautiful singing whose glow stayed upon us even in the silences between.

The list of singers I've travelled specifically to hear is very short. The list of male singers I've travelled specifically to hear is even shorter — it's just Peter. My horizons, you see, are broadening. It's true I was slow on the uptake. I was brought up on sopranos and mezzos, and so I took my time coming around properly to male voices. But these days I think I'm as swayable by male voices as female ones; in fact, when it comes to Australian singers, I think my preferences are if anything a little bit skewed in favour of the baritones of the species. I might not yet be at the point of flying across the world in pursuit of Simon Keenlyside, but a trip to Melbourne to melt in the presence of Peter Coleman-Wright? That I can happily manage. And really, if anybody was going to blaze this particular trail, it had to be Peter. I may originally have been his fan mostly by association, but that's been changing for some time — and after his stunning turn as Balstrode, I'd have joined the club no matter who his wife was. He's a glorious artist, a total delight; and if you ask me, as somebody did, whether this recital was worth the trip, my answer is — a hundred times over.

Intimations of bliss

Oh, opera, you're such a good influence on me. Generally speaking, my literary tastes don't extend much past 1960 — but with the world première of Brett Dean's Bliss edging ever closer and usual avenues of preparation unavailable, what else was a girl to do but to read the novel? 

Yes, if you're Australian, you probably don't need that incentive, because you've probably already read it, and/or have a definite opinion about Peter Carey. But I'm not Australian, and despite literally growing up in a bookshop, I'd never heard of Bliss until I heard about the opera. (I had heard of Peter Carey, though. I'm not a total philistine, honest.) I've also not seen the film, though I suppose I really must sometime between now and next March. Not that I necessarily think either book or film is absolutely vital to appreciating the opera — it ought to function as a work of art on its own terms, and I'm sure it will. In my case, though, I feel I'd like to replicate as far as I'm able the sort of popular consciousness of Bliss which so many Australians seem by definition to possess and which I, until recently did not.  

Would I ever have read Bliss otherwise? Perhaps one day, but quite possibly not. Am I pleased I've read it? You could say that. All I asked was to be prepared (fore-armed?) for the opera, and lo and behold, I found — let's not say bliss — true delight. I liked the humour, the complexity and sheer imagination of it. I liked Carey's ability to take you one way with a character, lull you into what seemed like understanding, then veer unexpectedly into pyschological territory you never saw coming. I liked those sudden switches from past to present to future, unheralded, and populated by pronouns not immediately explained, so that you're just lost enough to enjoy the tangle before it's pulled straight again. I liked the tree scene and the subsequent curse (now there's an aria straight from Verdi). I don't want to live in a commune, but I'm glad Harry did. I liked Harry, even though that first page description of his oversized moustache had me preparing to feel the opposite. And above all, I liked the style of Carey's prose. Novels live or die for me on the strength of their writing; the most riveting plot in the world can't hold me if the writing is unreadable. But I love the way Bliss is written; I find Carey's wry, rambling, chatty — then swiftly poetic — style incredibly engaging. 

What we can expect from Amanda Holden's libretto, I've no idea. What will be changed, removed, added, rearranged and rethought, only time will tell. (At least for those of us not privy to the years of development and workshopping this opera has gone through.) If it captures just a fraction of the lyricism and insanity and (I'm going to say it) sheer joy of the novel, though, then I'd say it's going to be at least a little bit special. Not to mention that all this bliss will be in the hands of Neil Armfield, with whom I suspect many of us are still smitten, post-Grimes.

With regards to the music, I'm even more in the dark. All I have is my imagination and Boosey & Hawkes, whose website holds a few tantalising hints. Like the entry for Dean's 2004 work Moments of Bliss, "a suite of four purely orchestral movements which will form the basis for several orchestral interludes throughout the opera". The composer's program notes on that page give a few intriguing, if fleeting, insights into the opera itself; then again, I'd imagine a lot can change in five years. The other highlight of this entry is the scoring of the suite, which is entertainment enough in itself:

4(IV=picc).3(III=corA).4(II=Ebcl,III=bcl,IV=dbcl).3(II=whirly tube,III=dbn)-4.3.3.1-timp.perc(4):I=vib/SD/sizzle cym/tgl/3gongs/7cowbells; II=lg tam-t/5tom-t/3bongos/5susp.cym(incl.1sizzle cym)/whip/marimba(shared with IV)/glass chimes/tamb/tuned gong/whirly tube; III=sm tam-t/xyl/glsp/SD/lion's roar/4t.bells/tuned gong; IV=BD/marimba/full drum kit/glsp/2tgl/1crot/tuned gong-2harp-elec.git-pft(=cel).MIDI kbd(using Ableton LIVE via Mac computer)-strings(16.14.12.10.8; pincipal 1st vln=elec.vln; 2vln/vla/vlc=whirly tube; 1 female 2nd vln="Wheel of Fortune"; all vlc/db require a medium soft timpani stick)

Lions and gongs and whirly tubes, oh my! 

Then there's the song cycle Songs of Joy, which was premiered last year by Peter Coleman-Wright with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic under Sir Simon Rattle. According to one of the linked articles:

In the first song, Harry's Vision, the protagonist describes his journey through Heaven and Hell. The energetic Ballad of Little Titch is a tall story which Harry tells on his first time out after his convalescence. The final Sonnet is a serenade to the new love in Harry's life, after he abandons job and home to settle in the rainforest.

Strange to think all those Liverpudlians have heard these songs and we still haven't. My anticipation grows. I also note that one of the articles says that Peter "will take the lead role of the adman Harry Joy on stage in Australia, Germany and the UK" — we already know it's slated for the Edinburgh Festival, but Germany too? This bodes well. Our opera seems to have legs; and Peter can become to Harry Joy what Gerald Finley has to J. Robert Oppenheimer. 

Finally, there is the entry for the opera itself. A few hints, although nothing especially revelatory. A couple of characters have had names slightly changed: Joel has become Johnny, Adrian has become Nigel. The small chorus of "Managing directors" sounds like something out of G&S, don't you think? The synopsis is pretty straightforward and — warning — contains spoilers. Knowing the cast, I couldn't help but read the novel with those singers in my mind's eye — even though doing so led to a few traumatic moments — and while some were a bit hard to square with their characters, others seemed immediately like perfect casting. Barry Otto notwithstanding, Peter Coleman-Wright just is Harry Joy for me now, before I've even heard or seen him in even a fragment of the role. I'll even accept the oversized moustache, if I must. 

122 days and counting until opening night. Perhaps I'll start a countdown clock in the sidebar. I really can't wait.

Peter Grimes

To whom does Opera Australia's new Peter Grimes belong? The first (and obvious and correct) answer is to Benjamin Britten. His genius is the fundamental reason why all of us who have seen this show are still reeling: without a trace of hyperbole, this opera is a great opera. Another answer — just as obvious — is that it belongs to Neil Armfield. It's OK, though. He hasn't appropriated it. He holds it in equal partnership with Britten. 

We can go further, though. This Peter Grimes must belong in some measure to Richard Hickox, who programmed it and who would have conducted it; and to whom, as Wanderer has pointed out, we must surely owe the casting of our beautiful Ellen Orford. It's trite but I'll say it just the same: he is there in spirit. It belongs, of course, to Opera Australia, as one of the company's finest achievements. (Such a bland term for something so rich.) It belongs to every member of the cast. It belongs to Crabbe the poet, and it belongs to Crabbe the character, written into the opera as a silent role and transformed by Armfield into an omnipresent ghost, grandfather and guardian angel. 

It belongs to us, the audience. I've rarely, if ever, felt such warmth and affection in an ovation as I did on opening night. Nor have I seen so many arms outstretched to applaud, as if we wanted to reach out and embrace the extraordinary group of artists who had just torn us so wonderfully to shreds. It also belongs to me. (And to you.) Forgive me if my writing on this opera is strange; if I write too little or too much, too often or too emotionally. I've never been so affected on every level by an opera before. Opera is what I do, it's my daily bread, and I had huge and definite expectations of this Grimes — but nevertheless, it has blindsided me, as if I never saw it coming. So you might find I'm just a little bit sensitive about it.

What struck me first — and what has stayed with me very strongly — is the reality of this Peter Grimes. Yes, the vast majority of what we see on the Opera Theatre stage is some kind of attempt to simulate reality; but Grimes doesn't attempt — it just is. All the signs of a show are there — some more obvious than others — and yet it seems like no show at all. That has a lot to do with Britten, of course; and it has a lot to with Armfield's direction, Ralph Myers's living, breathing sets, and Damien Cooper's perfect lighting. You can practically smell the sea air; I swear I did at one point.

And amazingly, that reality is achieved within a framework which could have resulted in extreme unreality. The opera takes place in several locations, indoors and out, but Armfield has moved all of the action into a village hall: a space which bears a close and deliberate resemblance to Opera Australia's own rehearsal venue, the Marrickville Town Hall. Even the scene in Peter's hut is played out on that hall's own, smaller stage, brought forward to fill the opera theatre's own proscenium arch. What's the more, the whole proceedings are watched over (and sometimes participated in) by Armfield's most daring touch, the kindly Dr Crabbe: he starts the show, he changes the set during the Interludes, he even opens the curtains on Grimes's stage-cum-hut. 

It could all have been so alienating, but it isn't. The hall might be Marrickville's cousin, but it also looks like every village hall, including the one you'd expect to find in the Borough circa 1945, the era in which Armfield has set his production. It makes me think of school fairs and prizegivings; it's so completely lifelike that even when the impossible happens, like Grimes dragging his boat across the front of it, there's little mental adjustment needed. Everything somehow makes sense. Including, for me, Dr Crabbe. He's already dividing people: some love him, some are ambivalent, some confused and some irritated. I, who have a tendency to fall unreservedly, love him. His presence, even at its most interventionist, seemed to me to reinforce, rather than detract from, Grimes's real existence. It was to him that Grimes's distracted utterances were directed, and when he comforted his creation — his child — or sat, drunk and depressed by that child's (both children's) fate, he seemed an on-stage surrogate for me and for all of us. Stuart Skelton's massive yet desperately fragile Peter Grimes was, at some level, a boy who needed a hug, and there, thank God, was Dr Crabbe to hold him, even if he didn't seem to feel it. 

So, to Stuart. He has come to us with so many expectations trailing behind (or ahead of) him. Not just the expectations of any tenor taking on such a significant and taxing role, but the expectations that come with a singer whose last attempt at that role had London reviewers comparing him favourably with Vickers, Langridge and Pears. It's as if we'd been sent a Mimi who'd been called the greatest since Freni — a huge weight upon one's artistic shoulders, but what a privilege for us to behold when the comparison holds true. And for Stuart, it does. He is worthy of his starry heritage, but he is not tied to it: he makes Peter Grimes all his own, and gives the kind of performance we've probably spent most of the season dreaming of. 

In both his singing and his acting, Stuart draws out unflinchingly the double nature of the character, brutal violence hand-in-hand with trembling softness. This is ambiguity at its most confronting: used not as a byword for misunderstood, but to create a character whose cruelty is as sincere as his kindness. He can soar powerfully, he can shout, he can sob; he can scale back to the sweetest, most lyrical pianissimo possible; and he can move so seamlessly through this considerable range that the singing he does is as natural as speaking. Stuart Skelton, our very own, is a singer who can (aided by Britten) make time stand still, which is what he does in his "Now the Great Bear and Pleiades" and again in his final scene — a mad scene which leaves even Natalie Dessay's bel canto heroines in the dust for sheer excruciating realism. I've only seen him perform it twice and yet it feels burned into my brain in his voice and in his person. 

Every time I talk about Susan Gritton, I seem to call her "our beautiful Ellen Orford". It's hard not to. Beautiful is what she is, in a deep-running way which you won't forget, once you've seen her. As with Stuart, after just two performances, I feel as if Susan has been Ellen Orford for as long as I've known who Ellen Orford is. I didn't know what to expect from her — I've heard her, intermittently, on various recordings (her sublime Ottone in Villa, conducted by Hickox, stands out) but they don't convey the live experience, not one bit. There is her voice, for a start: a soft, rounded soprano, sweet as they come but with immense reserves of power. She sings in two places at once, her voice rising to the heavens and yet remaining gorgeously grounded: her Ellen is radiant, good and strong, but she is real, not some idealised angel. Against the hugeness of the crowd, of the hall, and of Peter, she is small but steadfast. In her first duet with Skelton's Peter, she establishes herself and her character as equal partner, as strong in her own, quiet away as her rough-hewn Grimes. Her Embroidery aria is both beautiful and terribly painful. When she bursts into tears, so will you.

Peter Coleman-Wright's Balstrode is something of a revelation to me. He gives this greying sea-captain a depth and soulfulness which I simply did not expect. Opinion seems to vary, depending on which review you read, as to whether Balstrode should be classes as a principal or supporting role, but in Peter's case there is no question: his Balstrode is as vital and as three-dimensional as Grimes and Ellen. The growth in his character, from wry onlooker to involved participant and maybe the only source of moral support, is exquisitely played out, and so fully developed that I suspect he seems to be onstage much more than he actually is — his presence is felt even in his absence. And I don't think I have ever heard Peter's voice sound better or more purely lovely than here. It undergoes the same transformation as his character, beginning solid and tough, but as the performance progresses it opens up' it softens, and gains in warmth. He avoids every cliché, and brings out all the heart and humour (he's very funny) in his character. I'm happy to call this the best performance I've ever seen him give.

Meanwhile, among the ranks of the definitely supporting, the support offered is superlative. Elizabeth Campbell, last seen this season (although I didn't see her) singing Amneris, shifts gears completely to become a dark and twitchy Mrs Sedley: respectable lady, crime fetishist and laudanum addict. The characterful strangeness of her voice laces her words with a healthy hint of malice, and she gives a memorable portrayal, no more overdrawn than the libretto would have her and quite striking in her "Murder most foul it is". Catherine Carby is a relatively young and lightly sung Auntie. The production doesn't underline her more dubious activities too heavily: she's mostly publican, with only a hint here and there of what goes on upstairs. She eases her way into the role, coming into her own in the women's quartet. Her relationship with Balstrode comes across well, too, although she hasn't his hidden depths. Taryn Fiebig and Lorina Gore are too delicious for words with their matching brown hair and fabulous dresses (by Tess Schofield, who deserves huge praise for all of her costumes) and their singing is just as pretty. They're such an inseparable pair, both vocally and physically (they hold hands much of the time) that I won't try to do so: as a double act, they're just what they should be. Like Auntie, their downstairs behaviour is mostly on the harmless, almost innocent side; but in their physical interactions with men (first Balstrode, then Swallow) hint at what's beneath their outward girlishness. 

Two Young Artists turn in especially fine performances. Andrew Moran's sly, grinning Ned Keene is a welcome speck of comic relief among the bleakness, and his easy, lithe baritone is always a pleasure. And tenor David Corcoran, who seems to go from strength to strength with every performance, is an absolutely splendid Bob Boles — he even vomits on cue. If you didn't already know, I don't think you'd necessarily pick David as Young Artist: his performance here has all the grit and polish of a seasoned professional. Jud Arthur is in especially resplendent voice as Hobson, intoing that very first "Peter Grimes" and later showing off his percussion skills, as he beats the drum which calls the mob to action. Richard Anderson is a lean-voiced, breathy and suitably officious Swallow, disgracing himself very nicely in his dalliance with the Nieces. Kanen Breen is prim and uncharacteristically restrained (the hand of Neil?) as the Reverend Horace Adams; this kind of repertoire is just right for his voice, and he's a striking visual presence, too, so long and thin in his black cassock. 

Two extremely talented actors take the two silent roles. Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke is just heart-rending as the tiny, ill-fated apprentice John. He mightn't speak, but the expressiveness of his face and gestures speaks volumes, and he depicts the child's fear very convincingly. I challenge you stay dry-eyed when he breaks down in tears at Ellen's questions. Peter Carroll's Dr Crabbe is mesmerising. Make what you like of the role itself, and its function in this production, but there's no denying the brilliance of his performance. He embodies his invented role as if it were the most inevitable role in the world, conveying Armfield's conception with such commitment that he seemed to me to slot quite naturally into the world of the opera. I never found him distracting — if anything, I sometimes forgot he was still there at his desk — and when he did take centre stage, there was always a reason, and every moment seemed keyed precisely to the music. 

The chorus takes on one of its biggest challenges of the season and emerges triumphant. Whether scattered about the hall making nets, or massed at the front of the stage crying "Peter Grimes!" for all they're worth, they are as strong an ensemble as anyone could wish for. We know from last year's Billy Budd how well the men's chorus can handle Britten, and now the women prove themselves likewise impressive. And they do all of this while also faithfully recreating Borough life in all its tiny details — in the early scenes especially, you can look anywhere on the stage and see some believable business going on. There are more opportunities, too, for a solo line here and there, and these are all handled very well indeed.

With so much magic happening onstage, what good fortune to have a man in the pit who can handle it and cultivate it. I'm sure we'd all prefer Mark Wigglesworth's company début to have happened under happier circumstances, but the intelligence and poetry of his leadership are a worthy tribute to Richard Hickox. He negotiates this complex, precarious landscape (seascape) of a score with eerie grace, exploring the opera's intricacies without neglecting its monumental sweep, and evoking Borough life as perceptively as Armfield does. We heard the AOBO play the Four Sea Interludes earlier this year, in concert under Sir Richard Armstrong, and while that was an impressive performance, they're better still in context and with Wigglesworth in charge: the shifting, translucent quality which was missing from that earlier reading, he restores. The response to him, on opening night especially, was incredible: when he took a bow before the third act, I half expected a standing ovation to spring up then and there.

So much written. So much (so much) still unsaid, and much of that unsayable. There will, I fear, be more: I'm planning to attend all four remaining performances. I hope as many people as possible will also attend at least one of them. It took us almost the entire year to get here, but this is without a doubt Opera Australia's show of the year. And it's so much more than that. It's an experience — musical, theatrical, emotional, everything-al — which, if you've made it as far as this without booking a ticket, you simply must have. Nothing I've said here does it justice. It's magic and it's real life, all at once. It's a masterpiece.

Fidelio IV

Nothing like a bit of backstage drama to liven proceedings. There were no white slips at Fidelio last night. The lights went down as usual. And then Adrian Collette emerged from behind the curtain to announce the delightful havoc which was going on behind the scenes.

Having missed much of the season due to illness Nicole Youl (who, you'll remember, was herself a replacement for the originally announced Lisa Gasteen) had been all set to sing in this closing night performance, but curiously enough, in the process of warming up she had discovered herself to be indisposed again after all. No details on exactly how that works, but there it was. And Elizabeth Stannard, who has been substituting for Nicole throughout the season, was in Melbourne: evidently nobody thought she'd be required. So, no leading lady. No cover. Who do you call? Why, Anke Hoeppner, of course. As Adrian explained, she'd just recently come back from singing the same role for Opera Queensland, and "thought she was having a quiet night at home". Brilliant, I thought: I've been wishing we could have had Anke from the start, and now we're actually going to hear her. Well, not quite yet: "she's on her way to the theatre". So the curtain was delayed until 8.15 and we all headed back out to the foyer to await the day-saving diva.

She came, we went back in, and despite a far from ideal situation, she was magnificent. If only we could have had her from the start. Certainly it was disconcerting to have the role doubled in this way — particularly as Nicole still delivered the spoken dialogue herself — but considering the alternatives, this was as good as it was going to get, and besides, the chance to hear this voice in the role was worth all the weirdness. Anke's shining, powerful soprano was quite thrilling to behold, and even though she was stuck at the side of the stage in concert attire, she was as dramatically committed to the role as anyone else on stage. For all the madness of the circumstances — which had a few grumbling, but which I for one found rather enjoyable — this was some very exciting singing, and I'm very very pleased not to have missed it. Surely it's about time now that Opera Australia just cast Anke in something from the beginning? She's fabulous, and it might save a bit of trouble.

Thankfully the rest of the cast was intact. Leonore-swapping is all well and good, but it wasn't really her I'd come back for: it was Peter Coleman-Wright's irresistably evil Don Pizzaro, of course, especially after he cancelled on me last time. But he was back and as terrifying and fabulous as ever. Lorina Gore was still a drop dead gorgeous Marzelline, and everybody else was in fine form as well. I suppose only those who were at the single matinée she sang will ever know what we missed with Nicole. I have to say, she didn't seem much more dramatically convincing than the under-rehearsed Elizabeth Stannard. However, it's probably unfair to draw any conclusions from such troubled circumstances, and I still have no real clue how she might have actually sounded. 

Such is life. Others will probably be grumbling, and in some cases justifiably so, but I had a ball last night, and the fact that we ended up with such a fantastic soprano in the title role just made it even better. Not everybody will share my taste for backstage drama of course, but these things happen. It might not have been what you'd call an ideal$ Fidelio, but we did have an ideal Leonore, and that's a silver lining worth appreciating.

Fidelio

I posted briefly and breathlessly about Fidelio the day after it opened. Usually by now I would have written something longer about it but, quite apart from the lack of time, I wasn't sure there was really anything much to add. It's very rare that I manage to say everything I want to in a single paragraph, but this one came pretty close. That said, I'm still me, so there is more to say. 

I liked Elizabeth Stannard's last minute Leonore enough that, having decided I needed to see the show again, I booked for the very next performance on the off chance she'd still be singing. She was, and I continued to like her very much. Her voice does occasionally get swamped (more in Act I than Act II) and her acting is a little bit Dickensian urchin meets Cherubino, but she's still mightily impressive, and would be even without the special circumstances. 

However, the soprano I'm saving my best adjectives for is our Marzelline. Lorina Gore is completely fabulous. Marzelline has the distinct advantage of singing one my favourite arias in the whole repertoire, but Lorina won me over well before we got to that. Just her opening tiff with Jaquino was enough. She's girlish and spirited, but never silly, and she slices beautifully through all that orchestration without sounding effortful or harsh: she's always audible and always adorable. And she handles that aria (which always has me in tears) beautifuly, then promptly outdoes herself in the quartet, where her radiant singing and the dreamy look in her eyes are just heartbreaking.

It's just rave after rave with this show. Who next? Julian Gavin is extraordinary as Florestan. As good as he was in Butterfly, I still was not expecting that clear, strong, beautiful sound which emerged from the dark depths at the beginning of Act Two. Nor was I expecting him to tackle that unsingable first aria so magnificently. He's dignified and sensitive and when the going gets tough, his singing gets sensational. He's a genuinely heroic Florestan. Colour me stunned. I can't wait to hear whatever he sings for us next: I suspect it might be Massenet's Des Grieux, which is role I would love to see him in.

Stephen Smith is an utter delight as Jaquino. He's a natural actor, always engaged with the action even when he's not singing, or singing only in ensemble (case in point: the end of Act I of Manon Lescaut, where his Edmondo actually manages to draw one's attention away from Teddy) and his light, bright tenor seem to get more interesting with every role. Stephen was sick for the second performance, however, so instead we heard Andrew Brunsdon. And I have to say, while he might not be as immediately adorable as Stephen, he may actually be a better vocal fit for the role: the sound is stronger and more Germanic. He also looks very German. Actually, almost disconcertingly so. Meanwhile, Conal Coad is his usual amiable self, a warm and paternal Rocco with a voice to match. He's lovely in the fun of the opening scenes and just as engaging when events take a more dramatic turn. 

Even the smallest roles in this Fidelio have been impressively cast. Martin Buckingham and Andrew Jones are our two solo-ing prisoners, and both sing very well indeed. Particularly Jones, whose luminous baritone was a bit of a revelation to me. The chorus en masse are just as excellent, in fact probably more so. There are really not many sounds in the world to beat that of the men of OA's chorus in unison: here, as in Billy Budd, they are magnificent. And of course, there's Warwick Fyfe right at the end as the magnanimous Don Fernando, very noble and authoritative and for once not really gormless at all. I will say it once again, though: he looks like Napoleon. It isn't just the costume, although that helps.

Yes, you have seen through my cunning plan, I am indeed saving Peter Coleman-Wright for last. That's what you do with the best, isn't it? There are a lot of performances to be excited about in this show, but none quite so electrifying as Peter's Don Pizarro. Over dinner before the show, we were discussing Australian Scarpias, and neither of us having seen Peter in the role, we wondered how well he could pull off pure evil. Well, his Pizarro answered our question in about two seconds flat. He's absolutely terrifying. He delivers his opening speech with the menace and perfect German of a movie Nazi and then moves into an absolutely bloodcurdling "Ha! welch' ein Augenblick" which is truly one of the scariest things I've ever seen on that stage. The rest of his performance is at the same superbly malevolent level, his acting and singing so dark and so compelling that one can't help but be drawn to him, irredeemable as he is. And he tops it all off by very charmingly playing up the villain act in the curtain calls: on opening night, he met the audience's pantomime booing with a suitably melodramatic swirl of his cape, and at the following performance, raised his arms skyward like some mad dictator. He is brilliant. If the rest of the show were a disaster, it would still be worth seeing just for his Pizarro.

Not done yet, but nearly there. Just two more raves. Jonathan Darlington has caused me to fall quite swooningly in love with the AOBO. Beethoven helps too, of course. They sound so sublime in the overture that at the second performance, I thought: if this was it, and there was no singing, that really would be just fine. Once the singing starts, of course, that feeling subsides, but only a little: this is still some of the most beautiful playing I think I've heard from this orchestra. 

My final words of praise are for the production team. John Gunter's design is lavish and bold and a wonder to behold, especially the towering, brutal sets. There's an ingenious set change for the final scene: very impressive, although I can't quite bring myself to join with those actually giving it its own round of applause. Serious kudos too to lighting designer Nigel Levings: there's a lot in this libretto about light and darkness, and his imaginative lighting engages nicely with all of that. 

However, it is to Cathy Dadd that I really doff my non-existent hat. Michael Hampe's production is seventeen years old and completely traditional: the sort of thing which could quite easily lose its magic in revival and end up unfocused and dull. But this Fidelio is none of those things. It's vibrant and downright riveting theatre, just as vivid as if it were a brand new production. That's helped by the presence of so many individually excellent performances, of course, but Dadd deserves high praise indeed for the way she's drawn all that brilliance together into such a triumphant whole. I said it before and I'll say it again: See This Show. 

Fidelio

Two problems in posting about opening night of Fidelio last night. One is that I have to leave for Manon Lescaut in about twenty minutes. The other is that I don't know where to begin. 

Should I start by expressing my extreme admiration for Elizabeth Stannard, who substituted at very short notice (she only got into town the previous day!) for Nicole Youl as Fidelio/Leonore, and managed so magnificently that, had there been no announcement, one could easily have believed she'd been the cast from the beginning? Should I start with the terrifically terrifying Peter Coleman-Wright, whose Don Pizarro is the stuff of the very best sort of nightmares and who is on his own quite enough reason to see this show? What about the gorgeous Lorina Gore as Marzelline or Stephen Smith as her irresistible Jaquino? Or maybe I should start with Julian Gavin whose clarion tenor was a wonder to behold? There's even Warwick Fyfe, for whom (as I have said before) somebody really needs to write an opera about Napoleon: he's the spitting image. And Conal Coad, who brings real heart to Rocco the jailer. Let's not forget the Opera Australia chorus, especially its men; or Jonathan Darlington's inspired leadership of the AOBO. And what about Cathy Dadd, who has managed to make a revival of a seventeen year old traditional production look like something newly and brilliantly conceived?

You see my dilemma. I was completely blown away by this show last night. Not just because it was so good, I suspect, but because it was not a show I expected to be so stunning. I was looking forward to it only in moderation, and lo and behold, it exceeded my every expectation. In terms of all round excellence, I'm quite happy to go out on a limb and declare this Fidelio the best show of the Winter Season so far, and, with Madama Butterfly* (and probably Peter Grimes to come) perhaps the best of the year. Twenty-four hours ago I couldn't have imagined saying such a thing; now I'm practically ready to shout it in the streets. See this show!

*oh, and Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk as well, obviously. 

Puccini at Customs House

There's intimate, and there's intimate. We praise the intimate nature of performances in the City Recital Hall. Even the Opera Theatre seems pretty intimate compared to a grand American opera house. Intimate is a relative concept.

Intimate is one thing. Pacific Opera's fundraising concert last night, billed as "An Intimate Puccini Evening" was quite another. The Barnet Long Room at Customs House is a pretty tiny venue to begin with, seating only 160 in what they call "theatre style". For last night's concert, I doubt it sat even that many. We entered via the stage, stepping down into the seating area to find only four or five long rows arranged lengthways in the centre, facing a stage not much larger than a reasonably large dining room table. 

This was intimate and then some, the sort of set-up where it feels almost inappropriate to sit in the front row. Almost. I did, of course, sit in the front row. Front and centre. Hardly surprising, since I am always a front row kind of girl, but even less so when you realise that this intimate evening was to be shared with the extraordinary Cheryl Barker and her gorgeous husband, Peter Coleman-Wright. Masterfully accompanied by Pacific Opera's music director Andrew Greene, they sang excerpts from Madama Butterfly, Tosca and Manon Lescaut, interspersed with shorter pieces from Pacific Opera alumni, James Roser and Penelope Mills, and commentary and anecdotes from the always engaging Moffatt Oxenbould. 

Moffatt opened proceedings, praising, before anything else, the extraordinary acoustic of this unusual venue. He was clearly excited as he explained to us that they had discovered, in first trying the room out, that it produced a "rehearsal ambience", that live, resonant acoustic which performers always strive to reproduce in the more cavernous space of an opera theatre, but which, in its raw, ideal state, is not often experienced by us mere punters. He promised us something "quite extraordinary", underlining repeatedly the intensity of what was to come. His words could also have been construed as a warning to the faint hearted. 

Intense was putting it mildly. Incredible acoustic, small space, singers in full flight and an audience so close that even those in the back row were probably not much further from the stage than a front row audience at the opera house would be. It's not every day you experience a concert in such conditions, and thank god for that — this was magnificent, but if all performances were like this, it would be a health hazard. As it was, the sheer power and richness of sound might have proved a bit overpowering for some tastes. The concert might have been on a very small scale, but the performances certainly weren't. If you loved the voices in question, this was heaven; if you didn't, well, it might have been hard going. 

But I can't imagine anybody could have felt anything but love, or at the very least, admiration, for these four voices. Penelope Mills was all sweetness and light, particularly touching as Mimi in the duet with Marcello (one of only two points in La bohème which soften my stony heart) and James Roser's smooth baritone was lovely to hear. 

And then there were Cheryl and Peter. Are we spoilt, or what? I know it's standard Antipodean practice to gaze, green-eyed, at the concert schedules of Paris, New York, London and Milan but there are moments when such jealousy is left in the dust. This was one of them. There was nowhere I would rather have been last night than Circular Quay, sitting barely five feet away from the one soprano I'd rather hear than any other in the world, listening, awestruck, as she blazed her way through the kind of "Vissi d'arte" which, had I been hidden away in a big, dark theatre, would have made an embarrassing mess of me. The fact that all I had to do to get there was finish work, change my shoes and take a two minute train ride just adds to the preposterous good fortune of it all. 

They began with Butterfly, the scene between Sharpless and Cio Cio San. What a luxury to have Peter as Sharpless. I love his voice more all the time, partly by association, it's true, but mostly because he's fabulous. He's one of few baritones whose voices I think I would recognise immediately. Nobody else sounds quite like Peter, and nothing sounds quite so good as Peter did in this particular venue. And if we're speaking of luxuries, the greatest of all is to have such an intimate audience with the Butterfly of Cheryl Barker, one of the Butterflies of her generation. Adjectives are redudant, she just owns this role, and that's that. Her "Che tua madre dovra" was wonderfully hard to take at such close range, and when she mimed the sword-in-neck on "Morte!", I flinched. 

Then Tosca, the duet between Scarpia and Tosca. The woman who, only ten or fifteen minutes earlier, had been such an earnest and finely wrought Butterfly, was instantly a fiery, imperious Tosca, so terrifyingly real that you'd scarcely believe it was the same woman, in the same dress. And yet she was, and she was...oh, I don't know. Supply your own superlative. Peter was indecently smooth and suave, quite genuinely lecherous in his advances even if they were on his own wife. Peter and Cheryl, it has to be said, do chemistry remarkably well, be it this kind or the Arabella kind. Their duetting was fantastic, but Cheryl's "Vissi d'arte" was on another plane — despite all of us breathing down her neck, and without sets, costumes or more than a few minutes of context, she was utterly, thrillingly in character, singing those oh so familiar words with revelatory conviction and that steely yet graceful voice of hers, the one which slices my heart into a thousand besotted shards. 

Finally, a fragment of Manon Lescaut, truly only a fragment as they'd opted to drop Manon's "In quelle trine morbide" and begin from "Poiche tu vuoi saper". A shame to miss out on the aria, but just quietly, I love the subsequent duet even better. It's included on the duets disc they recorded for ABC Classics, and I never tire of hearing Cheryl's impassioned "Vieni! Vieni", so it was bliss to hear it (and the rest) in the flesh. Peter was a beautiful big brother, and Cheryl an irresistible Manon, moving convincingly from coquetry to sincere affection and concern. As if I needed another reason to look forward to her debut in the role next season. 

And that was it. No encores, partly, I suspect, because the set-up in the theatre meant it took them most of their ovation just to get backstage again. My calculations tell me it was a two hour concert, so I suppose it must have been, but it felt quite a lot shorter. I could happily have taken a lot more of the same. Then again, just that "Vissi d'arte" should sustain me for quite a while yet. So, thank god for Pacific Opera, and for their need to fundraise. Philanthropy never felt so good.