So here's something new - I'm doing a review! This season, I will be attending Opera North's entire 'Little Greats' season at the Grand Theatre in Leeds - a series of six one-act operatic gems arranged into various double bills. Today's outing was their adaptation of Ravel's 'L'enfant et les Sortilèges', performed at 2.15pm on 7th October 2017.
L'enfant is an incredible piece - just 45 minutes long and absolutely packed with meaning and emotion, both musically and within its narrative. Without giving too much away, a young boy misbehaves, trashes his room and then the items which he's trashed come to life to show him the damage he's done. Even within that synopsis, there could be a lot to infer and unpack. Annabel Arden's interpretation, while very full of visually pleasing extremes in colour and character, allows for the subtleties of interpretation to shine through in such a brilliantly non-pompous way, so much so that I was having new thoughts about the meanings of moments hours after the performance had ended! A clever beginning, where the child enters a simple door to the real set of the piece allows the audience to suspend disbelief for the wackiness that is to come.
And this really is a wacky piece. The music is at times unsettling and in combination with Hannah Clark's bold costuming and Theo Clinkard's suitably brash choreography, the audience is treated to an onslaught of heightened sensitivity. The dark and mature aspects remain, though, and are easily inferred (perhaps too easily during a rather hilarious moment with a teapot spout and a pair of teacups). This is clearly an adaptation that exposes the madcap beginning and darker moments towards the end to the maximum in order to appeal to children and adults alike. While sometimes, due to the subtleties of interpretation also being present, the meaning on either side of this scale can get lost or sometimes even go too far, on balance it is successful in doing so.
Orchestrally, this music doesn't sound easy at all, and the skill of the orchestra of Opera North and its conductor for this performance, Anthony Kraus really did shine through. There were some beautifully played moments where the music was executed with such sensitivity in combination with beautiful staging so as to produce one of the most memorable operatic moments for me to date (the scene, in case you are wondering, where the child arrives outside... check out the croaking song below for a taste).
As always, Opera North takes the chance to show some of the best operatic talent to us. Most memorable for me was Fflur Wyn with her incredible vocal acrobatics as Fire, and beautiful sensitivity as the Princess. Wallis Giunta as the child did an admirable job, but for some reason I never quite took to her character. Perhaps this was to do with Ravel's music, Colette's libretto or indeed Giunta's performance - I'm not too sure. Perhaps, as a bratty child, she did brilliantly, in fact. Almost too brilliantly.
Kudos, too, to Opera North, for creating the opportunity for young people like myself to be able to attend an opera like this and sit in one of the best seats in the house for only £5. Opera North is a company I am proud to work for on occasion for just this reason - it strives to be inclusive in so many different ways and this opera is a shining example of that. I can't wait for the next five!
Overall, L'enfant is a brilliant, entertaining and wacky little gem, uncomfortable in all the right ways, and some of the wrong ways, I'd highly recommend it for a quick, fun, thought-provoking and memorable trip to the opera.
★★★★☆
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