Norma review – Bellini with shock tactics

Bellini's opera is set in ancient Gaul during the period of Roman occupation. Designed by Niki Turner, Olivia Fuchs' staging places it in some non-specific modern context – the equivalents of the Gauls might be eastern European Roma. During the overture, soldiers in contemporary combat uniform violently abuse women within the perimeter fence of a concentration camp, raping several of them and recording the act on mobile phones. It's a deliberately shocking image and, not surprisingly, Bellini's writing does not match it; indeed, it is hard to think of any music that could.

Norma, though, does not deal with occupation from a political viewpoint; instead, it explores its impact on the personal lives of a handful of individuals, both oppressors and oppressed. Where Holland Park's evening scores highly is in some of its central performances, and in the conducting of Peter Robinson, who leads the City of London Sinfonia in a reading that lacks nothing in impetus while keeping faith with the nuances of Bellini's style. It is on this level – rather than that of the production's artificial hand gestures, or its costuming of Norma as a 19th-century diva, or in the surtitles' repeated references to the goddess Gaia, who is never mentioned in the original – that the evening gains a measure of genuine success.

In particular, Yvonne Howard's interpretation of the title role possesses real musical and dramatic authority; she takes on its huge challenges one by one and conquers them all. As Adalgisa, her rival but ultimately loyal friend, Heather Shipp is almost equally fluent and expressive, matching Howard note for note in their great duets. More limited in tone and woodenly acted, Joseph Wolverton's Pollione struggles to keep up with them, while Keel Watson provides the grandly voiced Oroveso.