Rachel Nicholls

A Pre-Raphaelite searing delight: Tristan und Isolde, Grange Park Opera

***** Take singers in fabulous voice, the Gascoigne orchestra luxuriating in Wagner’s exquisite music and a visually and theatrically intelligent and beautiful production and you have Grange Park Opera’s life-affirming Tristan und Isolde. From those unmistakable opening sounds rising from the orchestra, under Stephen Barlow’s conducting, in the small and intimate Grange Park auditorium it…

An exquisite Die Tote Stadt, Longborough Festival Opera

Loughborough Festival has scored a glorious success with this exquisite and moving production from Carmen Jakobi of the until recently long-neglected Die Tote Stadt. With central performances of extraordinary power and beauty, this telling of Korngold’s 1920 opera relies on compelling acting and singing from Peter Auty as Paul, who is locked in a world…

Rachel Nicholls Longborough role debut

Following the withdrawal of soprano Noa Danon due to illness, Longborough Festival Opera announces that soprano Rachel Nicholls will make her role debut as Marie / Marietta in the festival’s forthcoming production of Korngold’s Die tote Stadt (21-27 June 2022). Nicholls stunned audiences in the role of Brünnhilde in Longborough’s 2013 Ring cycle and then…

Singers and orchestra save this show from being a ring of dire

I sometimes wonder whether Wagner sets some sort of challenge from beyond the grave on the Ring Cycle to test its strength. The challenge being: who can make such a pig’s ear of a production to destroy the magnificence of the music and the impact of the story on audiences. This time it was down…

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