Wexford Festival Opera
The Wexford Festival Opera ( Opera Festival Wexford ) is a specialized primarily on rare opera festival in the Southeast -Irish town of Wexford. Among the games played in Wexford operas include many unknown works by famous composers (eg Verdi's Aroldo ) and settings of famous opera substances of the standard repertoire by other composers (eg Gazzaniga's Don Giovanni).
History
Emergence of the festival under Tom Walsh (1951-1966)
The origins of opera festivals are in Sir Compton Mackenzie's visit to Ireland in November 1950. Mackenzie was the founder of the magazine The Gramophone and a very beleseneer music writer who gave a lecture on the prospects of the Wexford Opera. Mackenzie suggested the group to start his own theater, the Theatre Royal (later to 2005 permanent venue of the festival ). This theater, which he planned was perfectly suited to perform certain operas.
The result was that a group of opera lovers - including Tom Walsh, who was elected as the first director of the festival - from October 21 to November 4, 1951, a " Festival of Music and Art " (as the event was called for the first time ) planned. The highlight was a production of The Rose of Castile ( 1857), a little-known opera of the famous 19th century Irish composer Michael Balfe, which was also mentioned by James Joyce in Ulysses in a striking play on words.
In the next few years, the Festival Opera has positioned itself as a unique institution that always offered rarities alongside the works that are played everywhere, and this was weithzin perceived by the specialized trade press, which reported in detail on each season.
In the first decade Wexford offered his increasingly interested in the rare works lovers and professional audience rarities like Lortzings poacher and ( for its time ) obscure works, such as Bellini's La Sonnambula, with Marilyn Cotlow as " Adina " and Nicola Monti as " Elvino ". Bryan Balkwill, Charles Mackerras and John Pritchard were among the young conductor who worked in the episode with the famous producers and designers such as Michael MacLiammoir. For that time the results were amazing and the festival soon became the center of attraction leading operatic talents, and applies to both new and established.
Increasingly, it was possible to recruit singers like Nicola Monti, Afro Poli, Franco Calabrese and Paolo Pedani and to present emerging British and Irish young stars like Heather Harper, Bernadette Greevy, Thomas Hemsley and Geraint Evans here.
Due to the renovation of the theater in 1960 did not take place the season. At its opening in September 1961, Verdi's Ernani was presented.
Problems with the receipt of the Irish Radio Orchestra led to the attraction of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra for this one season, but it has again used the Irish Radio Orchestra in the following year, which therefore also to the year 2005 best here.
L' amico Fritz helped the 1962 talented young Irish singers Veronica Dunne and Bernadette Greevy to international attention, while other famous names from the 1960's, Mirella Freni as in Bellini's I Puritani were heard. Jules Massenet's Don Quichotte 1965 led to another outstanding event with the bass veterans Mirsolav Cangalovic as Cervantes ' old knight.
With Albert Rose began in 1965, a young conductor from Prague a long-term collaboration with the Institution, who conducted eighteen Wexford productions. Later he became principal conductor of the RTÉ Symphony Orchestra and at the time of his death in 1997 he was its honorary conductor.
Wexford under Brian Dickie (1967-1973)
In 1967, Walter Legge was asked to take over the festival management, but within a month after his appointment, he suffered a severe heart attack and was forced to retire. Then took Brian Dickie, a 26 -year-old former student at Trinity College, the management of the Festival. A new era with outstanding vocal soloists emerged, with the first operas of Glinka in Russian and works of the Czech repertoire, but also a renewed emphasis in the French repertoire as Delibes Lakmé (1970) and Georges Bizet's Pearl Fishers (1971).
Wexford under Thomson Smillie (1974-1978)
Dickie was persuaded to return to Glyndebourne, but his successor in 1974 was Thomson Smillie, who came from the Scottish Opera. He made himself strong for a production of three operas. During this time much has been neglected, Massenet's opera quickly became his favorite, and Smillie staged as Thaïs in his first season, and then set this option with a number of other operas of the composer continued that belonged rare Sapho was produced in 2001.
In 1976, Benjamin Britten's The Turn of the Screw was presented along with a rarity of Cimarosa, the one-man piece Il maestro di cappella. Other rare Italian operas of the 18th century were in 1979 and also introduced the following years.
Wexford under Adrian Slack (1979-1981)
Adrian Slack focused mainly on the Italian opera. There were some exceptions, such as Handel's opera Orlando, Floyd's Of Mice and Men, and Mozart's Zaide. Spontini's La vestal was memorable because of a mishap, as all actors from slipping on a steep, a smooth surface of the stage as it was impressively described by Bernard Levin.
Wexford under Elaine Padmore (1982-1994)
Elaine Padmore was a producer of the BBC, which had previously organized the transmissions of the productions in this channel. During her tenure as director, she fanned on a wide range of music and singers, with many remarkable productions in Wexford. She first presented about Sergei Leiferkus an audience outside of Russia along with many other newcomers such as the American dramatic soprano Alessandra Marc. Other outstanding productions included the two productions of the debutante Francesca Zambello, the first time Donizetti's L' Assedio di Calais and 1993 Tchaikovsky slippers afforded in 1991.
A new idea realized Padmore from the year 1982, namely the presentation of "Opera Scenes ", ie excerpts from operas. This proved to be a cost-effective alternative for younger viewers as well as offering more work on the chorus. The idea proved to be very successful.
Michael Balfes The Rose of Castile, who had already been excavated at the beginning of festival activities, was revived in the spring of 1991, directed by Nicolette Molnár and furnish of John Lloyd Davies in a professional production, so the festival is now his 40th birthday celebrated.
Wexford under Luigi Ferrari (1995-2004)
1995 Padmore was replaced as artistic director by Luigi Ferrari, then director of the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, and later director of the Teatro Comunale of Bologna. Of course, he developed his own style by favoring Italian and late Romantic works such as Meyerbeer's L' Etoile du Nord in 1996.
In 1994, a four-year series of commercial recordings from the festival was started, there was from the outset radio broadcasts from the festival, and many seasonal programs were also broadcast by the BBC. The fiftieth Festival in 2001 was a special event by the introduction of surtitles.
Wexford under David Agler (since 2005)
David Agler became artistic director and chose the programs since 2005. He is an American conductor who had previously been the musical director of the Vancouver Opera held and permanent conductor at the San Francisco Opera.
A follow - idea of the original idea of " Opera Scenes", was the concept of " operas in short form " mainstream works were then administered in highly concentrated doses, and this developed into an extraordinary success.