Peter Grimes, starring Stuart Skelton as the eponymous fisherman (Picture: Robert Workman)
Peter Grimes, starring Stuart Skelton as the eponymous fisherman (Picture: Robert Workman)

There are several reasons to catch this revival of Peter Grimes.

Chief among them is the blistering performance of Stuart Skelton as the titular fisherman suspected of killing his young apprentices.

Skelton’s lustrous voice combines beauty and power, and his upper register is full of money-note thrills. However, it’s the risks he takes that push his interpretation into the realm of greatness.

When he sings the opening of the mystical soliloquy Now The Great Bear And Pleiades on the quietest sustained E imaginable – a real tightrope feat of breath control – it draws his characterisation of Grimes to new levels of vulnerability and loneliness.

David Alden’s expressionistic production, which places the action in the 1940s, feels tighter than it did in 2009, too. The stylised, angular gestures are sharper and the details more nuanced.

However, certain elements don’t work – for example, why is a butch, metropolitan lesbian running a seaside tavern? – and Alden’s efforts to satirise the hypocrisy of Grimes’s neighbours sometimes feel strained.

Musically, however, it’s hard to fault. Elza van den Heever is vocally and dramatically knockout as Grime’s friend Ellen and Iain Paterson gives a towering performance as the tough-love naval officer Balstrode.

In a terrific supporting ensemble, Dame Felicity Palmer stands out as a piece of luxury casting in the pivotal role of Mrs Sedley. With Edward Gardner’s white-knuckle conducting and the chorus on top form, it adds up to a show with a punch.

In rep until Feb 27 (next perf Thu), Coliseum. www.eno.org

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