Opera Scotland

Traviata 2008Scottish Opera

Read more about the opera Traviata

Scottish Opera's 2008-09 season was unusual, in that it did not feature any revivals. What is more, the level of presentation, musical and dramatic, was also of a consistently high standard. Perhaps the one slight disappointment was the Edinburgh Festival offering, a rare staging of Smetana's charming domestic comedy The Two Widows. This was the company's second production of the piece. It was joined by two popular classics, La traviata and Così fan tutte, both directed in memorably intelligent fashion by David McVicar. The rarities were by Cimarosa (The Secret Marriage) and Massenet (Manon). Bellini's I puritani was given in a single concert performance. These were all company premieres. The small-scale tour was, unusually, an operetta, The Merry Widow. After the great success of the previous year's opener, the company also put on a second group of new, experimental 15-minute chamber dramas in the 5:15 series. Another welcome rarity was the next collaboration with the RSAMD - a large student cast assisted by Scottish Opera's musicians and technical staff, in a hugely enjoyable version of Prokofiev's Love For Three Oranges.

David McVicar's Traviata was an instant success for the fairly obvious reason that it told the story in a straightforward but fresh manner - the set was essentially a black gravestone slab, with a moveable back wall. Costumes were mid-nineteenth century in style. The ballet representing a bullfight added to, rather than detracting from, the development of tension. Even Violetta's death avoided the usual stagger across the stage. Carmen Giannattasio's British stage debut was a great success, touchingly acted. Richard Zeller, a welcome visitor in a number of Verdi roles, including one previous run of the Espert staging, was as good as expected. The only slight disappointment was Federico Lepre as Alfredo - an excellent Fenton is generally unlikely to have the power required to sing the heavier role, and so it proved.