AFTER Wednesday’s premiere performance of Verdi’s “Falstaff”, Mid Wales Opera’s international cast can be seen at Theatr Hafren, Newtown, again tonight and Saturday, September 3 and 4, at 7.30pm with free pre-performance talks in the theatre at 6.30pm.
Tickets at £10-£26 are available from the Theatr Hafren box office on 01686 625007 or www.theatrhafren.com
A major national tour follows starting at Colchester on September 14.
Dates include Theatre Severn, Shrewsbury, on Thursday, September 23; Theatr Brycheiniog, Brecon, on Friday, September 24; The Courtyard, Hereford, on Wednesday, October 6; Theatr Harlech, on Saturday, October 9; Theatr Stiwl, Wrexham, on Wednesday, October 27; and Aberystwyth Arts Centre on Wednesday, November 3.
The tour ends at Ludlow Assembly Rooms with two performances on Friday and Saturday, November 12 and 13.
Verdi’s music for Falstaff is full of variety, wit and sparkle and the humour is fully realised in Amanda Holden’s sharp English translation. Accompanied by the much praised Mid Wales Opera Chamber Orchestra, under the baton of Nicholas Cleobury for the first time, this production promises to be a treat for opera goers both old and new.
Verdi’s last work tells the story of Shakespeare’s loveable rogue, the errant knight Sir John Falstaff, played by leading baritone Charles Johnston who sang “Rigoletto” for MWO in 2002, and regularly plays with English National Opera and English Touring Opera as well as opera festivals such as Holland Park and internationally.
“Falstaff” was Verdi’s only major comic work and is generally recognised to have been written by a master musician at his creative peak with one of the great baritone roles.
Falstaff has been making amorous advances to Mistresses Ford and Page and tries to engage his drinking cronies, Bardolph and Pistol, in an attempt to cuckold the jealous husband, Ford. Meanwhile the wives want to thwart Ford’s plan to marry his daughter to the odious Dr Caius.
Based on Shakespeare’s character from “The Merry Wives of Windsor” the opera is a comic tour de force, but it is the women who turn the tables to outsmart the men and give young love its chance.
The merry wives are led by Scottish soprano Lee Bisset as Alice Ford, with young Australian soprano Martene Grimson as her daughter, Anne Ford; the Swedish mezzo Catrin Johnsson and Mid Wales Opera favourite contralto Gaynor Keeble, as Alice’s old friends Meg Page and Mistress Quickly.