Season Previews

Season Previews from around the world

Longborough Festival Opera’s exciting 2021 update

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News about Longborough Opera in 2021

Longborough Festival Opera to stage three productions in Circus Big Top this season

Longborough Festival Opera has introduced a new venue for 2021: the Big Top. Three of the festival’s 2021 productions will take place in this new venue: Così fan tutte, The Return of Ulysses and The Cunning Little Vixen.

The indoor/outdoor space offers different and exciting theatrical possibilities for the creative teams, as well as excellent seating flexibility, allowing for a larger socially distanced audience than the Longborough theatre can offer. The space can also be turned into an outdoor venue as required, with the possibility of performing with the sides removed.

Longborough Artistic Director Polly Graham comments: ‘We are determined to bring our audience a wonderful and unforgettable season, and the safety of everyone involved is our priority. I am delighted that we can offer this exciting new venue for 2021 and keep live opera happening through such a challenging time. Opera in the round opens up so many different ways of expressing a story. Audiences will feel drawn in and almost part of the action. It’s opera undressed, as the focus shifts to the music, text and performance, rather than big sets and costumes, and the space itself also becomes a part of the storytelling.’The Big Top is a purpose-built auditorium with a socially distanced seating plan. The stage and amphitheatre will be clad in timber, to assist with the even spread of sound. As with the productions in the theatre, surtitles will be present for every production and visible from every seat.

2021 Performance Dates

Die Walküre: 1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12, 14 June 2021
Così fan tutte: 23, 26, 27, 29 June, 1, 3, 4 July 2021
The Return of Ulysses: 13, 15, 17, 18 July 2021
The Cunning Little Vixen: 29, 31 July, 1, 3 August 2021

Fundraising Campaign: The news of the new venue follows the success of Longborough’s 2020 fundraising campaign, which generated over £300,000 for freelance artists involved in the postponed festival and the generation of future work.

Longborough Festival Opera announces schedule for Der Ring des Nibelungen: Longborough Festival Opera will continue its Ring cycle this June, with a performance of Die Walküre in the beloved Longborough theatre. The festival will then stage Siegfried (2022) Götterdämmerung (2023) building to the full cycle of Der Ring des Nibelungen in 2024.

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Surrey’s Grange Park Opera Summer Season – 10 June to 17 July 2021

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Grange Park Opera Summer 2021

Tickets go on sale to the public on Tuesday 23 March for the 2021 season at Grange Park Opera, Surrey (10 June – 18 July).

This season covers a deliberately broad range of productions from the traditional, a rarity for connoisseurs, to a brand new – and highly topical – work. And then there’s an old favourite thrown in.

The season curtain-raiser is an unmissable production of Falstaff with opera superstar Bryn Terfel in the title role. Of equal importance, is the world premiere of The Life & Death of Alexander Litvinenko, the tragic story of the poisoning of the Russian dissident, which has been rescheduled from the Lost 2020 Season. Opera giant David Pountney directs Rimsky-Korsakov’s hidden gem: the composer’s first opera, Ivan the Terrible – also known as The Maid of Pskov – and then there’s the world’s favourite opera, La Bohème, to round off the season.

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Hallé resumes Winter Season with five new online concerts – 18 March to 29 April 2021

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Hallé’s Winter Season – 18 March to 29 April 2021

The Hallé is delighted to announce the new dates of its critically acclaimed online Winter Season, with five new concerts streamed from the Hallé’s Manchester homes, The Bridgewater Hall and Hallé St Peter’s in Ancoats.

Sir Mark Elder (conductor) and Hallé (c) Russell Hart

The orchestra’s Music Director, Sir Mark Elder, will conduct three concerts, while Assistant Conductor and winner of the 2020 Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition Delyana Lazarova will make her concert debut with the orchestra (1 April). Special guest artists will include Isata Kanneh-Mason, performing with the orchestra for the first time (18 March), as well as Paul Lewis (25 March) and Stephen Hough (15 April).

The final concert in the series will see Sir Mark Elder conduct Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale in a new staging directed by Olivier Award winner Annabel Arden which will be filmed in various locations around Manchester and feature three actors, a dancer and seven instrumentalists (29 April).

Each concert will remain available to watch on demand for three months after the initial broadcast.

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The Royal Opera House’s livestreaming of Brecht and Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins and Mahagonny Songspiel on 13 April and future plans

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Royal Opera House to open its doors on 17 May

Booking is now open for the Royal Opera House’s first live broadcast of 2021 – Bertolt Brecht’s and Kurt Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins and Mahagonny Songspiel. Produced by the Jette Parker Young Artists Programme, the double bill will be streamed live from the Main Stage in Covent Garden on 9 April at 7.30pm GMT.

FOR OUR RECENT REVIEW OF THIS BRECHT/WEILL DOUBLE BILL CLICK HERE

British Director and Jette Parker Young Artist Isabelle Kettle reimagines Weill and Brecht’s darkly satirical operas, following her directorial debut at ROH with Susanna which premiered in The Linbury Theatre in March 2020 (review click here).

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Scottish Chamber Orchestra announces six new concerts for Spring 2021, broadcast for free

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Scottish Chamber Orchestra Spring 2021 online season

Scottish Chamber Orchestra (SCO) today announces six new online concerts for Spring 2021, broadcast for free. During March and April, concerts include the World Premiere of SCO Associate Composer Anna Clyne’s Overflow, guest artists such as baritone Marcus Farnsworth and oboist Nicholas Daniel, works by Vítězslava Kaprálová and Dani Howard, and a version of Prokofiev’s Sonata for Solo Violin in D major played by 8 violinists. Filmed at The Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh and Perth Concert Hall, the concerts will be broadcast via SCO’s YouTube and Facebook channels and available for catch up for 30 days.

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Waterperry Opera Festival returns in summer 2021 (12 – 21 August)

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WATERPERRY OPERA FESTIVAL – 12 – 21 August 2021
Waterperry House & Gardens, Waterperry, Oxfordshire, OX33 1JZ

Following the sell-out success of the 2020 Mini-Festival, Waterperry Opera Festival will return with an ambitious ten-day open-air Covid-safe festival in August 2021. This year’s programme will include seven productions, as well as a variety of workshops, masterclasses, talks, and pop-up performances. With the advantage of Waterperry’s extensive historic grounds, the festival will continue to adapt and innovate in this changeable climate to create an engaging festival for all.

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Leeds Lieder’s six livestreams this spring from Leeds Town Hall

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Leeds Lieder announce Spring 2021 recitals presented from Leeds Town Hall

Leeds Lieder are delighted to welcome outstanding artists to Leeds this Spring including Dame Sarah Connolly, Gerald Finley, Fatma Said, Kitty Whately, Julius Drake and Joseph Middleton who will perform alongside some of the UK’s leading young artists (in collaboration with the Kathleen Ferrier Awards and Momentum).

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Opera Holland Park’s 2021 season opens on 1 June

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A breath of fresh air

Working with the set designer takis, Opera Holland Park (for information click here) has reimagined the stage and auditorium of its theatre. The new dynamic and exciting performance space provides maximum safety for audiences and artists under the company’s iconic canopy roof.

Artist impression of new auditorium

Capacity will be reduced from 1000 to 400 seats this season, using individual chairs that can be moved according to the numbers in each household ‘bubble’, to enable social distancing and increase step free access.

Sustainable materials in takis’s designs reflect the natural beauty of the theatre’s setting in Holland Park and a programme of five operas in which nature plays a central role. The Royal Philharmonic Society Award-winning City of London Sinfonia returns as resident orchestra.

Five full productions mark the return of live opera to Holland Park in 2021

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