We left at the interval...

Théâtre des Champs Elysées, Paris, Wednesday May 6 2026 Conductor: Sébastien Daucé. Production: Jetske Mijnssen. Sets: Julia Katharina Berndt. Choreography: Dustin Klein. Costumes: Hannah Clark. Lighting: Matthew Richardson. Calisto: Lauranne Oliva. Endimione: Paul-Antoine Bénos-Djian. Giove/Giove-Diana: Milan Siljanov. Giunone/Eternita: Anna Bonitatibus. Diana: Sun-Ly Pierce. Linfea: Zachary Wilder. Natura/Pane/Furia: Petr Nekoranec. Mercurio: Dominic Sedgwick. Destino/Satirino/Furia: Paul Figuier. Silvano/Furia: José Coca Loza. Ensemble Correspondances. Photos: Monika Ritterhaus, Laurent Guizard Dutch director Jetske Mijnssen’s production of Cavalli’s La Calisto , a work I last saw over thirty years ago (staged by Herbert Wernicke in Brussels), premiered last summer in Aix and has travelled to two or three French regional houses before arriving at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées - another example of the vitality and variety, against all odds, of opera in France’s regions. Mijnssen’s s...

ONP Garnier, Paris, Thursday September 29 2016 Conductor: Leonardo García Alarcón. Production: Thomas Jolly. Choreography: Maud Le Pladec. Eliogabalo: Franco Fagioli. Alessandro Cesare: Paul Groves. Flavia Gemmira: Nadine Sierra. Giuliano Gordio: Valer Sabadus. Anicia Eritea: Elin Rombo. Atilia Macrina: Mariana Flores. Zotico: Matthew Newlin. Lenia: Emiliano Gonzalez Toro. Nerbulone, Tiferne: Scott Conner. Sets: Thibaut Fack. Costumes: Gareth Pugh. Lighting: Antoine Travert. Cappella Mediterranea. Namur Chamber Choir. This Eliogabalo at Garnier offers a prime example of how different people's perceptions may be of the same production, as a quick read through the published reviews demonstrates. It was Thomas Jolly's first opera. Perhaps those most impressed are too young to find it an unexpected throwback to the 80s, not having lived through the decade. I found (most of) it gloomy, cold and corny. The stage was cavernous black and dominated most of the time by plain bl...

Opéra Comique, Paris, Thursday February 9 2012 Conductor: Vincent Dumestre. Production: Benjamin Lazar. Sets: Adeline Caron. Costumes: Alain Blanchot. Lighting: Christophe Naillet. Makeup and wigs: Mathilde Benmoussa. Egisto: Marc Mauillon. Lidio: Anders Dahlin. Clori: Claire Lefilliâtre. Climene: Isabelle Druet. Hipparco. Cyril Auvity. Aurora, Amore: Ana Quintans. Didone, Voluptia: Luciana Mancini. La Notte, Dema: Serge Goubioud. Apollo: David Tricou. Le Poème Harmonique. “Je me fais chier ” (French for “this is boring the crap out of me”). So said a friend two seats away as the curtain fell for the interval. Minutes later, on our way through the freezing night to our earlier-than-expected dinner at a Turkish restaurant, he insisted that he had nothing against Cavalli: he’d been enchanted by La Calisto in Brussels. But this production had, he said, none of the requisite magic, and the women’s voices were plain “ugly.” My inexpert understanding – misunderstanding, most likely ...