Prom 68: Britten – A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Garsington Opera, Philharmonia Orchestra

Royal Albert Hall, London

Tuesday 10 September 2024

*****

A dream cast and orchestra bring comedy, conflict and magic to Britten’s Dream

Benjamin Britten’s work is often performed at the Proms – The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra has been performed 44 times, there have been 31 performances of Four Sea Interludes, and even the gargantuan War Requiem has had ten outings. But last Tuesday’s Prom was the first time Britten’s opera A Midsummer Night’s Dream has been performed at the Proms. Britten wrote the opera for a much smaller space than the vast Royal Albert Hall, the newly reconstructed Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh which held only 316 people; the space was so small that some of the strings and one of the harps in the original score had to be removed. But there is a precedent for the opera being performed in much bigger spaces, such as the 4000-seater Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1996.

If this was to be the first performance of the opera at a Prom, it was fitting that it was such an excellent production. It was also the first time Garsington Opera had performed in a Prom, accompanied here by the superb Philharmonia Orchestra under Douglas Boyd. The orchestra brought Britten’s magical score to life, starting with ghostly, eerie strings, which represented ‘the wood, deepening night.’ Throughout the opera the orchestra played with rapt concentration, warmth and precision, beautifully shaped and controlled by Boyd. Special mention should be made of the virtuosic trumpet playing of Jason Lewis, who accompanied Puck’s appearances on stage.

Britten wrote the opera very quickly to an urgent deadline, and continued even when he felt ill. A few days before the premiere, he wrote in The Observer, ‘a lot of the third act was written when I was not at all well with flu’, but in a letter to Elizabeth Mayer a few months earlier he admitted he’d been diagnosed with, ‘gout – me, who can’t stand port!’ But despite his health problems, he brought his strong, sometimes schoolboy sense of humour to the opera’s third act, on Tuesday represented by a motley collection of rustics, Shakespeare’s ‘rude mechanicals’, who staged the uproarious ‘play within a play’. The Wall, played by Adam Sullivan (Snout) was covered in what looked like white plaster, the ‘lime and roughcast’ of Shakespeare’s text, making him so stiff he had to be carried by his colleagues. And there was a lovely moment when Quince (John Savournin) accompanied Thisbe (James Way as Flute) on his ukulele, trying to force him back into tune. As Hippolyta (Christine Rice) observed, ‘This is the silliest stuff I have ever heard.’

Perhaps more surprising, but very welcome, was the humour the quartet of lovers brought to the end of act two, where trousers and skirts were lost as in a French farce, and the physical humour brought well-deserved spontaneous applause. But even in this scene, there was a glimpse of one of Britten’s more serious, lifetime preoccupations – the loss of childhood innocence, in Helena’s lines to Hermia following the temporary breakdown of their childhood friendship, ‘O is all forgot? /All school-days friendship, childhood innocence?’ And there was another, brief but heart stopping moment in act three when the four lovers awoke to sing their Mozartian quartet, ‘And I have found [my lover] like a jewel.’ All four were in excellent voice, suiting their characters perfectly. Camilla Harris (Helena) had a lovely, light soprano voice, Stephanie Wake-Edwards (Hermia) a warm, rich contralto, Caspar Singh (Lysander) a plangent tenor, and James Newby a suitably robust baritone (Demetrius). All four relished their acting roles, bringing vivid characterisation to each one.

In his Observer article, written in the early 1960s, Britten described,

“the curious inverted snobbery current in this country which prefers operatic acting to be as bad as possible… I want singers that can act.”

The ‘play within the play’ was an opportunity for him to satirise the worst of wooden acting and 19^th century operatic cliches, but elsewhere in this production the high-quality singing was matched by excellent acting. The opera was semi-staged by Rebecca Meltzer, based on Netia Jones’ 2024 Garsington production, but there was never any sense that the limited room the performers had on the platform in front of the orchestra limited the staging or acting.

Oberon was superbly played by countertenor Iestyn Davies, who has also performed the role for English National Opera and at the Aldeburgh Festival. It was fascinating to compare his performance with that of the late James Bowman in the classic Peter Hall production for Glyndebourne in the early 1980s, still available on DVD. Bowman was magisterial and otherworldly in that production, and completely dominated his assistant Puck. In contrast, Davis was peevish and very human, sometimes arguing with Puck, and in particular delivering his showpiece aria ‘I know a bank…’ whilst aggressively threatening Puck. His voice was very different from Bowman’s rich, fruity and mellow tone, more florid and lighter, closer in tone to Paul Esswood or Brian Asawa. His Fairy Queen, Tytania (Lucy Crowe), often dressed all in white with vivid peroxide blond hair, sang her showpiece aria, ‘Come now a roundel’, with a gorgeously creamy, luxurious voice, beautifully controlling the coloratura parts. She brought humanity to her acting, playful when under a spell to Bottom’s charms, but regal in her dealings with Oberon, barely disguising her contempt for him at times. There was conflict between another noble couple too, Theseus (Nicholas Crawley) staggering round with wine bottle and glass in hand, while Hippolyta (Christine Rice) looked on disdainfully. And special mention should be made of Daniel Vening as Bottom, stepping in to cover for Richard Burkhard who was ill, but fitting in perfectly with other members of the cast.

Britten was inspired to make the role of Puck a speaking part when he was in Stockholm, where he,

“…. saw some Swedish child acrobats with extraordinary agility and powers of mimicry, and suddenly realised we could do Puck that way.”

Garsington’s Puck was Jerone Marsh-Reid who trained in physical theatre at East 15 Acting School and brought acrobatic prowess to the role, dressed in a garish green suit. Britten described Puck as. ‘absolutely amoral yet innocent’, but in this production, particularly in his relationship with Oberon, there was something of the immoral about him, more of a knowing adult than his more innocent portrayal by Damien Nash in the Peter Hall version. The Fairies, played by members of Garsington Youth Opera Company, were stunning throughout, with excellent intonation and ensemble – it was a joy to hear such accomplished young voices, including the individual solo voices. As mentioned, this the first time Garsington Opera has performed at the Proms. No doubt, with its resident contemporary orchestra The Philharmonia, it won’t be the last.

Performers

Iestyn Davies Oberon
Lucy Crowe Tytania
Richard Burkhard replaced by Daniel Vening due to illness Bottom
Caspar Singh Lysander
James Newby Demetrius
Stephanie Wake-Edwards Hermia
Camilla Harris Helena
Nicholas Crawley Theseus
Christine Rice Hippolyta
John Savournin Quince
Frazer Scott Snug
James Way Flute
Geoffrey Dolton Starveling
Adam Sullivan Snout
Jerone Marsh-Reid Puck

Garsington Opera
Philharmonia Orchestra
Douglas Boyd conductor

Semi-staging by Rebecca Meltzer, based on the 2024 Garsington Opera production directed and designed by Netia Jones

Sources

Benjamin Britten A New Britten Opera (The Observer, 5 June 1960)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Overture Opera Guides in Association with the English National Opera (Alma Books 2011)
BBC Proms Performance Archive
Benjamin Britten: A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Glyndebourne Festival Opera [1981] (NVC Arts DVD 2001)