United Kingdom Edinburgh International Festival 2025 [8]: Puccini, de Sabata: Soloists, Edinburgh Festival Chorus, RSNO Youth Chorus, London Symphony Orchestra / Sir Antonio Pappano (conductor), Usher Hall, Edinburgh, 16.8.2025. (SRT)
Puccini – Capriccio Sinfonico; Suor Angelica (concert version)
Victor de Sabata – Juventus
The Edinburgh International Festival is doing increasing amounts of its opera provision in concert form these days. You can believe that is because they are trying to create more one-off moments of artistic transcendence, or you can believe it is because they don’t have very much money. Either way, you cannot deny that what those performances actually produce is generally of very high quality, and you will find few higher than this concert performance of Suor Angelica.
That is mostly thanks to the man on the podium. Sir Antonio Pappano was Music Director of the Royal Opera House for 22 years, and experience like that shows. He understands perfectly all the Italianate warmth of Puccini’s orchestration, and he expertly brings out all the emotional depth from the characters, even when it is in the sedate setting of a convent.
It is no doubt thanks to him that the EIF assembled such an excellent cast for this performance, which heads to the BBC Proms next week in a different programme. It is crowned by a soul-shakingly moving performance of the title role from Carolina López Moreno, who has a rich, warm beauty to her voice – this nun is no shrinking violet – but she isn’t afraid to shade and colour its variety. At the climax of Senza mamma, for example, she shades the voice down to an unbearably moving pianissimo, before letting rip in the ecstasy and terror of the final scene. Opposite her, Kseniia Nikolaieva dominates the stage as the Princess. She sings with a rich, deep mezzo-soprano voice that seems to approach contralto resonance at times, and her gestures and mannerisms eat up the stage in a way that makes it impossible to take your eyes off her.
The rest of the cast is beautifully drawn, led by the always-stage-dominating presence of veteran Elena Zilio as the Monitor, the powerful Abbess of Monika-Evelin Liiv, with a bullet-force chest voice, and the disarmingly sweet Sarah Dufresne as Sister Genovieffa, the former shepherdess. The Edinburgh Festival Chorus are an uncannily huge chorus for this opera, and the ladies had an unfortunate tendency to attack from below the note in the opening hymn, but the spirituality of the final pages came through effectively.
By the time I had wiped away my tears at the end of Suor Angelica I had almost forgotten the first half of the concert; but then it was mostly forgettable music, two graduation pieces from musicians who went on to better things. Puccini’s Capriccio Sinfonico was an extraordinarily episodic patchwork of tunes and textures which sounded as though they had been lifted from operas that had never existed. When the opening bars of La bohème turned up, that only reinforced the impression. Victor de Sabata’s Juventus was more engaging, with plenty of upward thrust and impulsive energy, but it couldn’t shake the impression that its composer was throwing everything at it for the simple reason that he could. At least the musicians of the London Symphony Orchestra, drawing their EIF residency to a close, played both pieces with conviction, even if it was more than both pieces deserved.
Simon Thompson
The Edinburgh International Festival runs at venues across the city until Sunday 24th August. Click here for further details.
Featured Image: Carolina López Moreno (Suor Angelica) © Jess Shurte
Cast included:
Carolina López Moreno – Suor Angelica
Kseniia Nikolaieva – Principessa
Monika-Evelin Liiv – La Badessa
Elena Zilio – La suora zelatrice
Angela Schisano – La maestra delle novizie
Sarah Dufresne – Suor Genovieffa
Katie Lowe – La suora infermiera
Jenny Stafford – Prima Sorella Cercatrice
Caroline Bourg – Seconda Sorella Cercatrice
Hayley Meth – Suor Dolcina
Manon Ogwen Parry – Una Conversa I / Una Novizia
Julia Solomon – Una Conversa II
Susan White – Suor Osmina
I loved this Usher Hall performance.
A memorable tale of tragedy, ecstasy and redemption, sung with such feeling by the all female cast one forgot one was not in the opera house.
As well, as I came to hear it especially from London. I am listening to the BBC Proms performance as I write.
The LSO did you all proud this year – and aren’t we lucky to have Pappano at it’s helm, keeping him firmly at the heart of the London music world.