Orfeo review – descent to the underworld takes you to heaven

Sometimes everything comes right in the theatre. You know it when it happens, and Garsington Opera’s Orfeo is such a moment. It helped that the Chilterns weather was so benign for the summer season opening, but the real achievement belonged squarely to the performers and to director John Caird’s production team.

Monteverdi’s “fable in music” of 1607 tells the story of Orpheus and Eurydice in a psychologically intense musical word painting that is poised between the madrigal era and that of baroque opera. Caird’s beautifully deft production, with designs by Robert Jones and lighting by Paul Pyant, creates a pastoral Arcadian vision before tragedy strikes, and a shadowy underworld as Orpheus makes his doomed pursuit of the dead Eurydice.

Arielle Smith’s sinuous choreography grips most of all. The chorus, which is so critical to the storytelling, is in almost ceaseless movement, but always in sympathetic service of the words and music. There are virtuoso moments, notably from the three black-clad women dancers who bring to life Charon the ferryman’s boat across the Styx, but the choreography is a triumphant enhancement of the whole, never a distraction.

View image in fullscreen

There are multiple virtuoso vocal moments in Monteverdi’s score too, not least from the now veteran Diana Montague in the role of the messenger who brings the news of Eurydice’s death, and is so devastated that she retreats from the world to live in a cave. Frazer Scott provides a tenebrously dark-toned Charon, accompanied by the wonderfully filthy sounding reed regal organ. Ossian Huskinson as Pluto and Lauren Joyanne Morris as Persephone give fine underworld cameos. Zoe Drummond as Eurydice, Claire Lees as the embodiment of Music, and Laura Fleur as the spirit of Hope each make their marks too.

The true vocal pillars of this piece are, inescapably, the tenor Ed Lyon in the title role, and the ever active chorus, with its multiple brief solos, including at one point from the conductor Laurence Cummings. Lyon has the full range of tone that the Monterverdi demands, from hushed through lustrous to dark, and he decorates the text with formidable assurance. His finest moments, though, are in the conviction he brings to Orfeo’s outbursts as he prepares to descend into the underworld in pursuit of Eurydice, a moment which looks forward across the centuries to operas to come.

Cummings, directing from the harpsichord, and his English Concert musicians, played on stage throughout, sporting similar white and cream clothes to the dancers, and joining the staging at times. Much of the audience went along with Garsington’s encouragement to dress similarly, which added to the collaborative feel that was such a marked achievement of the production. There is an astonishing musical moment at the very end, which elevated this production still further. But no spoilers for those fortunate – and wealthy - enough to be attending later performances.

• Orfeo is at Garsington Opera until 3 July.