Opera Scotland

Don Giovanni 1976Scottish Opera

Read more about the opera Don Giovanni

Scottish Opera's subscription season 1975-76 at the Glasgow Theatre Royal contained ten operas in total, played in sequence. The gala Fledermaus on 14 October was followed by short runs of Otello, Hermiston, Ariadne on Naxos, Così fan tutte, The Golden Cockerel, Die Fledermaus, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Don Giovanni, Madama Butterfly and Falstaff. The Otello had been seen regularly since 1963, the Falstaff only once before, in 1966. Fledermaus had been launched during the summer while Hermiston had been premiered at the recent Edinburgh Festival - both were previously unseen in Glasgow. The only productions that were brand new were Ariadne and Rimsky-Korsakov's Golden Cockerel, unseen in Scotland for half a century, and only occasionally since then at Covent Garden.

The long-running Ebert/Koltai Don Giovanni staging, originally mounted in 1964, had already been toured in the autumn, directed by David Pountney. It was now added to the Theatre Royal subscription season and there was a recording made of excerpts.

This production also received some more performances on the spring tour, with a couple of cast changes as Ottavio and Elvira, as well as a different conductor. Other operas in that repertoire included Die Fledermaus, Ariadne on Naxos, A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Rape of Lucretia.

Throughout March there was also a medium-scale tour of Don Giovanni, sung in English, with most roles double cast. Ann Murray, Richard Greager, Arthur Jackson and Malcolm Donnelly were all heavily involved in that, as were the chorus members.