A powerful gale of sound in Budapest's Dutchman

By Michael Roddy, 09 June 2018

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Reviewed at Müpa: Béla Bartók National Concert Hall, Budapest on 8 June 2018

Wagner, Der fliegende Holländer (The Flying Dutchman)

Michael Boder, Conductor

Balázs Kovalik, Director

Péter Horgas, Set Designer

Mari Benedek, Costume Designer

John Lundgren, Dutchman

Elisabet Strid, Senta

Liang Li, Daland

Ric Furman, Erik

Bernadett Wiedemann, Mary

Franz Gürtelschmied, The Steersman

Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra

Hungarian Radio Choir

Hungarian National Choir

Ádám Fischer, Artistic Director

Elektra in Budapest: all goes well... until the last minute

George Jahn, 29th April

Balázs Kovalik’s interpretation of Elektra is revived in Budapest, impressing until the B-movie cliché finale.

****1

Sympathy for the Devil in revival of Mefistofele in Budapest

George Jahn, 10th April

Balázs Kovalik’s opulent staging of Boito's Faustian opera threatens to overshadow the singers, but it makes for an exciting spectacle.

****1

Hasse’s Artaserse in Munich: an unusual pasticcio

Sandra Bowdler, 15th May

Hasse’s Artaserse in Munich was a pasticcio using music from that work to tell the story of Wilhelmine von Bayreuth and to celebrate of Anja Silja.

***11

An homage to Wilhelmine von Bayreuth with Hasse's Artaserse

Orsolya Gyárfás, 21st April

In a pasticcio of Hasse’s Artaserse and Ezio, director Balázs Kovalik and the students of the Theaterakademie August Everding stage the life of Wilhelmine von Bayreuth.

***11

Mixed success for Leipzig's futuristic Turandot

Hugo Shirley, 22nd October

Balázs Kovalik's new dystopian Turandot is musically rousing but let down by a production that's more 1970s TV series than slick modern sci-fi.

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Hungarian State Opera's glossy Turandot

Jenny Camilleri, 30th January

Excitingly conducted and largely well-sung, this sumptuous but unfussy Turandot should please both traditionalist and adventurous operagoers.

***11

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Michael Roddy

Michael Roddy is a freelance journalist based in Ireland who formerly covered the arts and entertainment world, as well as general and economic news, for Thomson Reuters. He has interviewed many of the world's leading conductors, singers and composers and has covered and reviewed operas, concerts and festivals throughout Europe.