New Year double bill in Hong Kong: Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci

By Alan Yu, 07 January 2013

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Reviewed at Hong Kong City Hall: Concert Hall, Hong Kong on 5 January 2013

Mascagni, Cavalleria rusticana

Leoncavallo, Pagliacci

Opera Society of Hong Kong

Janara Kellerman, Santuzza

John Daniecki, Turiddu

Grant Youngblood, Alfio

Melody Sze, Lola

Cynthia Luff, Mezzo-soprano

Kristin Sampson, Nedda

Jeffrey Hartman, Canio

Brian Montgomery, Tonio

Alex Tam, Beppe

Nicholas Provenzale, Silvio

Lio Kuokman, Conductor

Lo King-man, Director

Hong Kong Virtuosi

Art imitates art in ETO's bracing new Pagliacci

Dominic Lowe, 10th April

Divorced from Cavalleria rusticana, English Touring Opera's contemporary take on Leoncavallo's masterpiece ticks all the boxes.

****1

Regents Opera’s Salome lands a knockout punch at York Hall

Mark Pullinger, 10th April

Mark Ravenhill directs a brutal, bloody Salome for Regents Opera at the spiritual home of British boxing, York Hall.

****1

Handel's Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno returns to Rome

Pia Maltri, 7th April

Robert Carsen's staging of Handel's oratorio arrives, via Salzburg, in the city where Handel composed it in 1707.

****1

Innocence: Saariaho’s final opera receives New York premiere

Kurt Gottschalk, 6th April

At the Metropolitan Opera, Innocence proves a gripping and perhaps divisive piece which feels real because it is a reflection of our reality, with no realistic hope of finding peace.

*****

Parsifal without the hocus-pocus in Lower Bavaria

Peter Quantrill, 4th April

A colourful, revue-style production dispels the clouds of mystique surrounding Wagner's last opera.

****1

Bless this house: a Passiontide Parsifal in Erl

Peter Quantrill, 2nd April

Alpine mountains and streams set the scene for an illuminating production of Wagner's 'play to consecrate a stage'.

****1

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Alan Yu

The first concert Alan attended was Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde. For 7 years he presented classical music programmes for Radio Television Hong Kong, partly to pay his way through university. He attends concerts whenever he can and believes there is no substitute for the thrill of live performances. He writes here.