Operalia, Gala Royal Opera House; The Fairy Queen, Glyndebourne, review

Operalia, * * *

Doesn’t Jane Austen suggest somewhere that “Nothing in life is so foredoomed as a scheme of pleasure”? She obviously didn’t know about star-studded, premium-priced opera galas, which can be guaranteed to offer high hopes on paper and deliver bitter disappointment on stage.

This one promised Placido Domingo presenting a pre-Olympic showcase of distinguished past winners of his annual global singing competition Operalia. Incidentally, out of more than 150 prizes Operalia has awarded over its twenty-year existence, not a single one has gone to a Brit. I wonder why?

The programme had no theme or coherence, being nothing more than a Classic FM-ish succession of familiar highlights. Somebody ailing always cancels at the eleventh hour: here that honour fell to Erwin Schrott. Julia Novikova sounded painfully flat in an aria from La Sonnmabula. A dry-voiced Rolando Villazon was all perky personality and phoney intensity; Joseph Calleja outsung him by several laps. Two recent laureates, soprano Sonia Yoncheva and tenor Stefan Pop did well enough in Depuis le jour and Che gelida mannina, but neither made one sit up and think of the gold standard.

That happened only twice in the evening. First when Domingo himself (who had sounded embarrassingly squeezed in Winterstürme, opposite a stately Nina Stemme) pulled something out of the bag and flung himself heart and soul into Gerard's monologue from Andrea Chenier; and secondly, when Joyce DiDonato expressed pure bel canto ambrosia over Rossini’s Tanti affetti.

Antonio Pappano conducted with his habitual gusto, and the show ended with a noisome mass rendition of the Sextet from Lucia di Lammermoor, some of the parts being doubled. I had quite a fun time, but how charitable would I feel if I’d spent £250 – and this wasn’t even a fund-raiser – on a ticket?

The Fairy Queen, * * * *

There’s more genuine party spirit to be had at Glyndebourne, where Jonathan Kent’s delightfully inventive and decorative production of Purcell’s “semi-opera” The Fairy Queen has been revived, authentically framed by Betterton’s bastardized version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Sensuous, urbane and witty, the score is a joy, and both the choral and solo singing and the orchestral playing under Laurence Cummings are supremely stylish. Penny Downie’s Amazonian Titania is an extra pleasure. But enough is as good as a feast, and the performance ends up seeming twenty minutes too long: I was left feeling glutted, rather than replete.

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