Opera no 162
Adès: The Tempest
Soloists
Royal Opera House Orchestra
Thomas Adès
This is now the start of the next phase in this project - some near contemporary operas.
I don’t think that I have heard any of Adès’ music before so this was a new experience. It took a while for me to ‘tune in’ to the style but once I got into the piece I really enjoyed it. The style is broadly tonal and it clearly by somebody who grew up in the world of Britten and Tippett. What is most impressive is the lyric writing - particularly the long scene for Caliban in Act two and the quintet in the third Act - the courage of a contemporary composer in being prepared to write in traditional forms - such as a love duet complete with the characters at one point singing in octaves - in the 21st century. I was also impressed with the rhythmic energy of much of the piece. There is a tendency in post war opera for the vocal lines to get bogged down in rather sterile and shapeless arioso but Adès largely avoids this and this does help in driving the drama forward. The orchestral writing is constantly inventive with some wonderful evocations of the spirit world. I can’t leave the opera without commenting on the stratospheric coloratura writing for Ariel - the setting of Full Fathom Five (Shakespeare’s words are glossed rather than quoted directly) is one of the most extraordinary things that I have heard in a very long time. I just wonder what on earth the singer must have thought when she saw the music for the first time.
