Opera Scotland

Don Carlos 1988Scottish Opera-Go-Round

Read more about the opera Don Carlos

Scottish Opera's piano-accompanied small-scale touring division had become increasingly ambitious, with three successive productions which had broken the previous mould. Following the success of Tosca (1985), Jenůfa (1986) and Macbeth (1987), it was to be expected that Opera-Go-Round would try to continue with something equally ambitious. That the choice should fall on Don Carlos seemed to many at the time to be a step too far, absolutely bonkers, threatening disaster. The degree of compression and editing required was inevitably far greater than usual - for instance, much of the auto-da-fè, one of the grandest scenes in all Verdi, was reduced to a piano solo with accompanying slide show. Indeed, the feat of Mark Dorrell in supplying the accompaniment all through a long evening was quite astonishing.

The whole show was paced beautifully, from the start of Act 1 (for this was a version of the five-act text) right through to the end. The singers also provided a great deal of pleasure, and all the usual highlights came off beautifully, especially the fourth act, from Philip's monologue, the argument with the inquisitor, the great quartet, Eboli's aria, and the prison scene, with Posa's death. The last act with Elisabeth's aria and the final duet also worked well, with no sign of fatigue, and some beautifully soft and subtle singing from Anne Williams-King and Colin McKerracher.

With only six soloists, there was some doubling of roles - a mezzo sang a few lines for Thibault before switching to her main role of Eboli, and the Monk, rather oddly, sang from behind a screen when called on to portray the vital role of the Grand Inquisitor. The seriousness with which the whole enterprise was treated was evinced by the fact that those dual roles were taken by David Gwynne, who had sung the Inquisitor regularly in the full-scale WNO production a few years earlier. This was the start of a long relationship between this excellent bass and the Scottish company.

But the reservations must remain - it was a long way short of giving people in the Highlands and Islands a proper idea of what Verdi's largest opera is all about. This was almost certainly the work's Scottish premiere.

Thirty-one performances are listed.  On 17 October, there was a further one at Invercauld Festival Theatre, Braemar, a venue we have been unable to trace.

Scottish Opera's Season - 1988/89

The programme for the 1988-89 season of Scottish Opera opened with Midsummer Marriage. The other new productions were Fledermaus, Rheingold, Don Giovanni, Oedipus Rex, Traviata and Street Scene. The revivals were Magic Flute, Iolanthe, and Bohème, In the autumn the previous season's Richard Jones Così fan tutte, redirected by Tim Hopkins, went out on the medium-scale tour. There was also a small-scale, piano-accompanied tour of Don Carlos, so far Scottish Opera's only attempt at this work.