Tuesday night at the opera

I've been an opera buff since age ten. One evening when I was in fifth grade, my dad decided to watch our laserdisc recording of Don Carlo with Placido Domingo. And that was that. I started listening to my favorite arias and duets over and over again. Sometimes after school, I would come home and listen to an entire opera, following along with the libretto. I very nearly wore out our Bravissimo, Domingo! album (a cd my sister never wants to hear again, I'm sure... we shared a room at the time). I think Placido Domingo might have been my first celebrity crush.

The point is: I love opera. So naturally, attending an opera in London was an absolute must.

The Royal Opera House is
gorgeous. And quite massive.

Last night I went to see Donizetti's La Fille du régiment at the Royal Opera House. I chose to see an opera I knew nothing about in order to avoid any preconceived notions; I wanted something new and fresh and unknown.

Laurent Pelly's production of La Fille du régiment is absolutely charming. This second revival in Covent Garden was conducted by Yves Abel and featured Patrizia Ciofi as Marie, the "regiment's daughter," and Colin Lee as her lover, Tonio. Wonderful sets, impressive voices, the famous high Cs, jokes about the 2012 Olympics and cornish pasties, and Donizetti's delightful score all made for a rather wonderful evening. And it was nice to see a completely packed opera house on a Tuesday night.

"La Fille du régiment had its premiere at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1840. Its combination of exuberant comedy, genuine feeling and rousing, patriotic sentiment soon made it a national institution and it was regularly revived on Bastille Day in France. The opera had a long absence from Covent Garden, but in 1966 Dame Joan Sutherland reintroduced it to London, playing the irrepressible heroine, Marie, with Luciano Pavarotti as her lover, Tonio. La Fille returned to the Royal Opera House in 2007 in Laurent Pelly's delightful production, which has since toured the world.

Pelly's production fizzes with humour and features wonderfully inventive sets: enormous maps evoke the mountainous terrain of Tyrol, the regiment’s camp drowns in piles of laundry and an armoured tank bursts into a drawing room. Against this lively backdrop, Donizetti’s score weaves robust, military melodies with moments of pathos, such as Marie's moving farewell to her friends at the end of Act I. Other highlights include the bravura tenor aria 'Pour mon âme', with its vertical leaps to a succession of high Cs, and the delightful duet 'Quoi? vous m'aimez!' in which Tonio ardently expresses his love for Marie."

- The Royal Opera House

~L