Day: 9 August 2025
Pathos and hilarity meet at IF Opera’s new home.
IF Opera – Rigoletto & Orpheus in the Underworld, Church Farm, 2025 IF Opera’s move from the stately lawns of Belcombe Court to the working idyll of Church Farm has brought with it a pleasing blend of rustic charm and artistic ambition – plus the novelty of rescue donkeys grazing contentedly in the neighbouring field…
A shocking Lohengrin saved by glorious singing and fabulous conducting, Bayreuth Festival
*** Some productions jolt you like a live cable. Unfortunately, the thematic current running through Yuval Sharon’s Lohengrin at Bayreuth wasn’t the thrilling charge of Wagner’s drama—it was the sort of shock that a concept can be so overdone, leaving your battery flat. Elza van den Heever , Piotr Beczała Staged in 2018 but revived…