Opera Scotland

Intermezzo 2011Scottish Opera

Read more about the opera Intermezzo

Scottish Opera's second staging of this thoroughly enjoyable, if little-known, work settled into a thoroughly convincing interpretation after a couple of performances, The designs were shot through with elements reminiscent of art of the period, especially Klimt, and this generally worked well.

Anita Bader mastered the role of Christine in a confident style. Her voice initially seems light, but it is so well-focused that it carries over even the loudest of the orchestra's many purple patches. She also produced lots of beautiful soft singing. Roland Wood gave a masterly performance as Storch, with a lovely sense of humanity. Nicky Spence made his company debut as a suitably feckless Lummer. His voice had an unexpected dramatic edge which promises well for further Strauss roles in future. Sarah Redgwick also stood out as Anna, and her superiority over the other servants was made clear. The skat party also came over very strongly, with each character clearly differentiated.

Francesco Corti coaxed some glorious playing from the orchestra, just occasionally overwhelming the singers, but that seems to have been pretty much how Strauss wrote it. On balance, given such lovely sounds coming from the pit, that seems the better option.