Opera Scotland

Samson 1998Scottish Opera

Read more about the opera Samson

The 1997-98 season for Scottish Opera started with the brilliant idea of another look at the original 1912 concept of Ariadne auf Naxos. That version started with the performance of an abbreviated text of Molière's comedy Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme. This was seen at an early Edinburgh Festival in 1950, conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham, but had not been seen in Scotland since. The new production, which played at the 1997 Edinburgh Festival, was a co-production with Nottingham Playhouse. The conventional revision, with prologue, followed as part of the main season.

That season started with a long Opera-Go-Round tour of The Barber of Seville. This was followed by eight main stage productions: Norma, Rigoletto, Peter Grimes, Tosca, Così fan tutte, Ariadne auf Naxos, The Queen of Spades and La traviata. In addition there were concert performances of Handel's Samson and three performances of a double bill of Param Vir's Snatched by the Gods and Broken Strings.

Handel's great dramatic oratorios have been neglected in Scotland, indeed Scottish Opera were very slow to catch on to the great Handel revival in any way. So these performances were very welcome, with the excellent tenor Neill Archer in the title role and Patricia Bardon and Ann Archibald making important contributions. Perhaps the only drawback was the usual one when the company put on concerts - that they failed to take advantage of the great marketing opportunity available through taking the company to concert halls off the usual schedule.