Rooms of Elsinore is a new CD of music related to Brett Dean’s opera Hamlet. Those familiar with the opera will quickly recognise the sound worlds of all five pieces. Two began life as “character studies” for Ophelia and Gertrude respectively and so set words by Matthew Jocelyn. The first, And once I played Ophelia is scored for soprano and chamber orchestra. Some readers may recall Barbara Hannigan performing it with the TSO in 2019. Here it’s performed by Jennifer France with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra and the composer. It’s a tough sing with some very high sections and staccato repeated phrases. She does a fine job. Continue reading
Rooms of Elsinore
Reply
It’s still mostly festival season with two events coming up in Toronto.
Wednesday evening’s Shuffle Hour concert at Toronto Summer Music was given by mezzo Alex Hetherington and pianist Vlad Soloviev in Heliconian Hall and carried the curious moniker The Tortured Poets Department. It kicked off with the letter aria from Massenet’s Werther and let’s face it if anyone deserves torturing it’s some combination of Werther himself and Goethe for inventing him (and possibly Massenet for prolonging the life of a character who might otherwise have fallen into obscurity). Whatever, Alex gave a fine, impassioned reading of the aria which set the stage well for what was to follow. 
operaramblings 