Smoke without fire: Medée fails to ignite

By Hugo Shirley, 09 October 2018

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“Sonya Yoncheva... luscious beauty allied with righteous fire”

Reviewed at Staatsoper Unter den Linden, Berlin on 7 October 2018

Cherubini, Médée/Medea

Staatsoper Berlin

Daniel Barenboim, Conductor

Andrea Breth, Director

Martin Zehetgruber, Set Designer

Carla Teti, Costume Designer

Sonya Yoncheva, Médée

Elsa Dreisig, Dircé

Marina Prudenskaya, Néris

Charles Castronovo, Jason

Iain Paterson, Créon

Staatsopernchor Berlin

Staatskapelle Berlin

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Hugo Shirley

Hugo Shirley is a Berlin-based writer and musicologist. He has written widely as a critic in the UK, including for The Spectator, the Financial Times and Daily Telegraph, and has held editorial posts at both Opera and Gramophone. He was editor of 30-Second Opera (Ivy Press, 2015) and has a PhD in musicology from King's College London, where his thesis focused on Strauss and Hofmannsthal’s Die Frau ohne Schatten.

Smoke without fire: Cherubini's Medée fails to ignite at the Staatsoper