Les Troyens - Covent Garden in the Summer

[Segilla]

To quote / paraphrase Sorabji, 'Like the cuttlefish when pursued, Newman and Ferneyhough have emitted a cloud of ink -but very little else'.

I have my ideas of what I would prefer to see and hear but have no power whereas you have control. So it's no contest but at least I do not contribute towards nonsense such as men onstage sitting on lavatories or Brunnhilde with a paper bag on her head.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

You "pursuing" me, then, Seggy? Cor; how exciting! Shall I keep my hat on?

[Chris Newman]

To quote / paraphrase Sorabji, 'Like the cuttlefish when pursued, Newman and Ferneyhough have emitted a cloud of ink -but very little else'.

I have my ideas of what I would prefer to see and hear but have no power whereas you have control. So it's no contest but at least I do not contribute towards nonsense such as men onstage sitting on lavatories or Brunnhilde with a paper bag on her head.

Well, Segilla, it seems that you have thrice avoided actually answering my points, except to provoke and instead have put words into my mouth which I have not said.

Originally Posted by Segilla

And while you're at it, why not update the music?

Which I would not suggest, though I approve of reduced scores by talented composers like Jonathan Dove, which enable operas to be toured in small venues where Wagner or Janacek might never get heard, and that is a different matter.

If people like you are to have your way, how are new and future music lovers ever to experience what was intended?

I have not suggested that all productions should change time or place. You are supposing I will.

I have my ideas of what I would prefer to see and hear but have no power whereas you have control. So it's no contest but at least I do not contribute towards nonsense such as men onstage sitting on lavatories or Brunnhilde with a paper bag on her head.

I do not understand the first sentence. I have control over what? My days of performing or directing are long over. I am like you a retired person who happens to love opera.

Have I said I approved or promoted chorusmen sitting on lavatories or Brunnhilde with a paper bag over her head? Never! The first suggestion is nonsensical and dramatical nonsense. Similarly I detested the new production at the ROH of Rusalka for similar reasons but I loved the music making. That was not updating a fairy tale it was perversion. I am not familiar with Brunnhilde and paper bags. I presume it was a director's cheap version of a Tarnhelm, and rightly was ridiculed.

If opera or theatre is updated it is usually for good reason. I am sure you will regard me as beyond the pale for confessing this. As a student I sang Koko in The Mikado. I did it because I passed the audition and it was the only thing on that term. etc. It turned out everyone wanted to be in it but no-one wanted to direct it or design a set. So Muggins did the rest. I would rather have done Mozart or Smetana. To be blunt, I dislike the usual dull Mikado production with the flapping fans and the words droned out as if the cast are bored stiff. Firstly I designed a set based on Thomas Minton's Willow Pattern. In case you say it is Chinese, it is oriental in flavour but the design is British. Secondly the Willow Pattern story is vaguely similar to Gilbert's. Thirdly, a willow tree was apt. My main reason was I had seen several lovely opera productions at Glyndebourne (well, on tour) with sets by David Hockney. I suppose Minton's plate design enlarged so the bridge was crossable was my tribute to Hockney doing the same with Hogarth. Instead of that dreary fan flapping I made the men practice Karate all the time, but as soon as the "Amazonian" women appeared they grovelled before them in fear. It was a running gag till near the end of the opera when the women caught the men at their Karate. It had strong connections with the feminist Katisha, teased it and it was very funny. I was surprised the audience absolutely loved it though in my opinion it is not as funny as Jonathan Miller's ENO version.

[Richard Tarleton]

Have I said I approved or promoted chorusmen sitting on lavatories or Brunnhilde with a paper bag over her head? Never! The first suggestion is nonsensical and dramatical nonsense.
If opera or theatre is updated it is usually for good reason.

Chris I think the lavatories is a reference to a recent production of Ballo? I did see Jones's (lamentable, IMV) Ring (paper bag) twice, because it had the finest cast it was possible to assemble at the time.......

[kuligin]

Chris I think the lavatories is a reference to a recent production of Ballo? I did see Jones's (lamentable, IMV) Ring (paper bag) twice, because it had the finest cast it was possible to assemble at the time.......

Or perhaps to the toilet scene in the ENO Partenope, a truly dreadful production

[Chris Newman]

Or perhaps to the toilet scene in the ENO Partenope, a truly dreadful production

I do remember hearing about the Ballo. The few Jones productions I have seen appear to show he has mellowed a bit.

Sadly, I cannot get a ticket for the Trojans for less that £750 and most performances are sold out. In an "ideal" commercial world they could have put on more perfromances but in reality with such long roles as Aeneas, Cassandra and Dido singers need rests. I shall have to try the Proms arena.

[David-G]

Similarly I detested the new production at the ROH of Rusalka for similar reasons but I loved the music making. That was not updating a fairy tale it was perversion..

Well said. Unfortunately the perversion on stage prevented me from enjoying the music making.

I am not familiar with Brunnhilde and paper bags.

You are fortunate! Segilla and I are not so fortunate.

If opera or theatre is updated it is usually for good reason. I am sure you will regard me as beyond the pale for confessing this. As a student I sang Koko in The Mikado. I did it because I passed the audition and it was the only thing on that term. etc. It turned out everyone wanted to be in it but no-one wanted to direct it or design a set. So Muggins did the rest. I would rather have done Mozart or Smetana. To be blunt, I dislike the usual dull Mikado production with the flapping fans and the words droned out as if the cast are bored stiff. Firstly I designed a set based on Thomas Minton's Willow Pattern. In case you say it is Chinese, it is oriental in flavour but the design is British. Secondly the Willow Pattern story is vaguely similar to Gilbert's. Thirdly, a willow tree was apt. My main reason was I had seen several lovely opera productions at Glyndebourne (well, on tour) with sets by David Hockney. I suppose Minton's plate design enlarged so the bridge was crossable was my tribute to Hockney doing the same with Hogarth. Instead of that dreary fan flapping I made the men practice Karate all the time, but as soon as the "Amazonian" women appeared they grovelled before them in fear. It was a running gag till near the end of the opera when the women caught the men at their Karate. It had strong connections with the feminist Katisha, teased it and it was very funny. I was surprised the audience absolutely loved it though in my opinion it is not as funny as Jonathan Miller's ENO version.

You are quite within the pale. Your Mikado production sounds most imaginative and amusing. I would have loved to have seen it.

[Segilla]

It has taken me a while to re-read the Mémoires for the fifth or perhaps sixth time, a very necessary task as memory is not what it was. And to deeply scan my Barzun ‘Berlioz and the Romantic Century’ which I’ve had since 1951, and Cairns.

Berlioz and I go back some years. To 1950 in fact so I feel I can adapt his famous remark, ‘I have lived with this man for most of my life. I know him so well I think he knows me’**. That is why I am so deeply offended by interference with his wishes. Of course staging has to be ‘realised’ but within the context of what the composer required.

You approve of such interference with the instructions, but seem not to to the score, hence your mention of ophicleides. I am relieved to read that as it seemed to me that tin whistles or whatever were alarming possibilities. So the notes are safe but you are content to see the other part of his creation distorted - and that is the road to Rusalka staged in a brothel and a Troyens production in which Anna and Narbal were having sex on a temple roof while Didon was singing her death aria. Or the ridiculous Coliseum production where a smoking aircraft wing was on stage outside the gates of Troy and the singers of the sublime Septet had to squeeze themselves into a meaningless box; and Sarah Connolly showed her table dancing skills. To me, all this is not just nonsense, it is offensive as well.

Of the people who organise this rubbish, it would not surprise me if, were he here, Berlioz repeated his angry remark, ‘Frogs and toads’.

War may be war, but it was the Trojan war that Berlioz wrote about. He lived most of his life with a love of Latin, of Virgil and Cassandra, Dido and Troy. Nothing I read leads to a conclusion that he wanted people to mutilate his vision. Yet on one reading of the Mémoires, you are ‘convinced’ otherwise.

As for the pipsqueak. Are we not talking about the person who conducted a performance of Walküre (at the Coliseum if memory serves), where it collapsed due to his incompetence or inexperience? That is the arrogant man who decided for us that we must listen only to CDs.

It would have been nice to see one final production of Les Troyens but the distraction of alien concepts would interfere too much with concentration on the music. I shall listen to the radio instead.

You did not reply to my point about newcomers, but no matter I have now had my final say.

**I have lived my life with this race ... I know them so well that I feel they must have known me.
Hector Berlioz

[Chris Newman]

I wish this to be my final say on this matter as well. Segilla seems convinced that all potential faults in an as yet unseen prodection lie with me. I have tried to discuss the matter reasonably expressing my honest opinion that some modern productions are unworthy: people sitting on lavatories etc are not part of art to me either. On the other hand I believe that some hyper-realistic productions are down-right boring and massively over-budget. I preferred the simple Scottish Opera setting of the Trojans done with Alex Gibson to the elaborate one done a short while later at Covent Garden. I believe that in the hands of the stated production team the new ROH Les Troyens will be served well. I have a sense of imagination and do not need a period of history rammed down my throat. I know the story is set in a poetic Trojan age and my imagination can change the clothes.

Reading about how Hector Berlioz was treated by that half-hearted charlatan Leon Carvalho makes one want to throttle the rogue. Poor Berlioz only experienced a fraction of his opera on stage. Each performance became shorter as the "most popular pieces" were discarded to speed up the show and to cut out scene changes. It did not help that Berlioz was so ill at the time and had to leave the performances to unsympathetic lesser talents. However, it could be argued that the scenic expectations of that time were part of the problem and that with modern day lighting and stage machinery things could have been simpler for Berlioz and Carvalho.

The sad thing about this discussion is that except for the matter of stage setting Segilla and I have masses in common. A love of Berlioz's music for a start. [I]The Trojans Part One[/] was my first ever Prom when I was 19. Since then I have been to every performance of Trojans at the Albert Hall. I regard Berlioz, Janacek, Monteverdi, Mozart, Purcell, Schubert and Tippett as my favourite composers and will defend their music to the death. If Segilla happens to go to the Prom perfomance I would be very happy that we could meet as lovers of Hector Berlioz and not foes.

I am truly grateful that Berlioz's masterpiece is being performed. I wish I could go but the tickets after the Friends' sales have gone through are too pricey. £750 for a ticket is more than I will spend for 14 Prom concerts (including Les Troyens), 6 nights in London and 9 return train fares to Salisbury.

[LHC]

I am truly grateful that Berlioz's masterpiece is being performed. I wish I could go but the tickets after the Friends' sales have gone through are too pricey. £750 for a ticket is more than I will spend for 14 Prom concerts (including Les Troyens), 6 nights in London and 9 return train fares to Salisbury.

Chris, I was initially confused by your statement as the top price for stalls seats is about £250. After looking at the Opera House bookings, I see that performances are all sold out apart from two boxes on two separate dates. The £750 ticket is I think for a box of 4 seats; still expensive, but not quite the exorbitant £750 a seat your post appears to suggest.

[Chris Newman]

Thankyou for the clarification, LHC. As you say, still expensive. The ROH website is not the easiest of things to negotiate.

[Segilla]

I’d intended to have said my last word but I want to say that you are no foe, Chris. It’s probably the topic I feel most strongly about, irrationally so, maybe. It‘s a trigger point, a bit like a business colleague who on hearing two words would grow visibly angry. They were the name his of his former manager.

Too old and creaky now, I’ll not be travelling to London for the Prom although I would have made a supreme effort for the ROH.

I omitted to say that due to sudden unexpected snowstorms I was prevented from going to The Trojans in Cardiff over 20 years ago, due to skidding into a car coming up a steep hill near to where I lived. The rightly angry driver confronted me and said she had motored all the way from Heathrow to near Stroud without incident to be hit so near to her home.

I bow out with a bit of very risqué, irreverent and irrelevant barbed lightheartedness.

It was interviewer Sue Lawley in the infamous Paul Daniel Desert Island Discs programme who asked him the question, the answer to which riled me so much.

I was disappointed to hear her say in a later TV programme that they had become friends.
Not an unsuitable attachment I trust, bearing in mind that the satirical magazine Private Eye had reported that during her Bristol University days her nickname was yo-yo knickers.