Oedipus Rex

National Museum of Scotland, 12/8/24

Scottish Opera, Stuart Stratford (conductor)

What an interesting evening! Stravinsky’s one act opera, premiered in 1927 in Paris, with a libretto by Jean Cocteau from the play by Sophocles, was last performed by Scottish Opera in 1990. I first saw it in 1972, in a production brought to Scotland by Sadler’s Wells, paired with Bluebeard’s Castle.

Today, in the Grand Gallery of the National Museum of Scotland, it was performed on its own, and in a promenade production by Roxana Haines, with female voices added to the original men’s chorus for reasons which, according to the Director’s Notes, were not musical, bringing “the female voice into a story where women have not traditionally had agency.” It was very effective, but I’m not convinced it was justifiable in aural terms.

Scottish Opera and the Edinburgh International Festival were the co-presenters of the production, which will only see three performances, so, with the one-off ‘Cosí fan Tutte’ last Saturday, we have almost returned to the glory days of the Festival years ago, when only an Edinburgh Festival-goer could see some unique shows.

An excellent cast had been assembled, the Scottish Opera Orchestra, under Stuart Stratford, played magnificently, the professional chorus had been augmented by a Community Choir drawn largely from NHS workers in the Central Belt, and a fine Scottish actress, Wendy Seager, spoke the narration which Cocteau intended to act as a commentary on the Latin of the libretto, in the language of the audience. Why then did I come out of the Museum frustrated, and slightly disappointed?

The answer lies entirely with the venue, a magnificent galleried hall in an iconic museum, but as a location for great music-making, something of a disaster. As happened last year, when Scottish Opera put on Strauss’s ‘Daphne’ in St Mary’s, Haddington, opera outside the theatre is very difficult. As soon as voices are directed away from the listener, the sound dissipates and words are lost. It’s unsurprising that the great opera houses of the world were designed for the voices to project into large semi-circular auditoria, and we abandon that norm at a cost. Being challenged physically, I was sitting at one end of the gallery only and heard nothing of the singers at the other end. I did promenade a bit, but as soon as a singer turned away, the sound and all the words were lost. I am not usually in favour of giving singers microphones, but in this case I would recommend it for the remaining performances. The narrator was miked to good effect so why not, exceptionally, the singers. As it was, even singing directly at the audience, the acoustic of the Gallery forced all the singers to bellow at full voice all the time, severely curtailing any chance of vocal nuance.

This was a great shame, as they were very good. Shengzhi Ren, as Oedipus, has a fine tenor voice, but, as he was exclusively in the middle or at the far end, I could hardly hear him. Roland Wood blustered effectively as Creon, and Kitty Whately demonstrated a superb mezzo voice as Jocasta.  There was some excellent singing in the smaller parts as well, particularly Callum Thorpe as Tiresias and Emyr Wyn Jones as the Messenger. I also felt sorry for the principal singers, who were made to stand like statues on plinths for ages before the opera started. When will directors realise that singers are fragile creatures who need to be cared for and given the best environment to be at their peak? Standing still for twenty minutes plus, although looking great, is not conducive to good performance.

The chorus was very well-used, and obviously had a great time mingling with the audience, and this aspect of the production was excellent, allowing the spectators to interact with the performers. There were so many parts of the show that worked, but I think without miking the principals, I can’t rate it a success. It must be said that the majority of the audience I spoke to afterwards were very favourably inclined, but at the end of the day, opera is about singing, and if you can’t hear the singers, too much is lost!

Photo credit: Jess Shurte