MOZART'S THE MAGIC FLUTE / Singapore Lyric Opera / Review

 

MOZART’S THE MAGIC FLUTE

Singapore Lyric Opera

Saturday (20 December 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 23 December 2025 with the title "Well-rounded cast shines in SLO's The Magic Flute".

Singapore Lyric Opera’s pre-Christmas production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The Magic Flute seemed awfully late in the year but it was worth the wait. Incidentally, it was with this opera that SLO, then known as Singapore Lyric Theatre, made its 1991 debut at the now-repurposed Kallang Theatre in a semi-staged production.

In the latest iteration, British stage director Harry Fehr opted for an update to the near present, with an ageing Brotherhood needing fresh blood in the form of the opera’s hero Tamino. This did little to disguise the whole enterprise as Freemasonry in all but name.

Emanuel Schikaneder (1751-1812), the German actor-playwright / librettist and original Papageno who commissioned the opera, and Mozart were freemasons themselves. The opera with its story of chivalry, bravery and rituals, and music of solemnity and pageantry, was a celebration of the secretive cult, then outlawed by the Habsburgs.

The set and lighting design by Dorothy Png, costume design by Gianti Giadi favoured mostly black and white with very little shades in between. The industrial-looking set, while austere and forbidding, deftly separated the cast as “upstairs and downstairs”, a dichotomy between powers-that-be and those whom they look down upon as they seek to manipulate and control.

Photo: Singapore Lyric Opera

While no outright Masonic symbols were visible, the symbolism provided by the clearly-displayed gears and cogs of machinery was obvious. The gulf between the men and women, attired in business suits and housemaid costumes, was as stark as the divides between authority and servility, senility (evident by an inordinate number of walking canes) and youth, good and evil, all evident in this clever production.

Tamino, Papageno
with the Three Ladies.
Photo: Singapore Lyric Opera

What about the singing and acting? Tamino played by Peruvian tenor Oscar Ruben Alarcon Ore was fresh and youthful, but the show was stolen by Korean soprano Renata Hann’s Pamina, who stood tallest as a paradigm of virtue and innocence. The comic relief was provided by Korean baritone Edward Kim as the bumbling bird-catcher Papageno, much later joined by British soprano Kezia Robson’s Papagena as his longed for partner.

Papageno & Papagena
Photo: Singapore Lyric Opera

Joyce Lee Tung's Queen was scary!
Photo: Singapore Lyric Opera

The Queen of the Night’s imperious coloratura was helmed by local soprano Joyce Lee Tung, who never disappointed in her portrayal of villainy opposite her geriatric nemesis Sarastro, ably sung by Austrian baritone Benedikt Berndonner. The smarmy Monostatos (Kee Chun Kiat) and the conniving Three Ladies (Cherie Tse, Lin Renyue and Rebecca Chellappah) completed the well-assembled main cast.

The story-telling took the form of singing in German and conversation in English, all made easier with effective surtitling in both English and Chinese. The SLO Chorus (Terrence Toh, chorusmaster) was its usually buzzing self, always aware and alive to the action. All this would come to nought if not for Mozart’s sparkling and life-affirming music, composed within his final year, performed with love and attention by the SLO Orchestra conducted by Joshua Tan.

This has been an extraordinarily productive year for SLO, with this and April’s very successful take on Bizet’s Carmen. Puccini’s Madama Butterfly has been projected for July next year. All eyes and ears point to a revitalised SLO to come.

QUEENS AND DIVAS OF THE BEL CANTO / Lirica Arts / Review

 

QUEENS AND DIVAS OF THE BEL CANTO 

Lirica Arts 

Esplanade Recital Studio 

Thursday (17 April 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 19 April 2025 with the title "Lirica Arts' recital series combines outreach and education without dumbing down". 

Want to learn something about opera besides listening to wonderful singing? One could do worse than attending Lirica Arts’ Opera 101 recital series. Its carefully curated and meticulously researched concerts are what the musical scene really needs, genuine outreach and education with absolutely no dumbing down.

Shridar Mani did all the detailed research
for this excellent programme.

Its latest offering was a solid 95-minute treatise without intermission on the world of Italian bel canto opera. Listeners will already know something about this early 19th century’s operatic trend of seamless melodies and elaborate ornamentation, and the usual composer suspects. This concert, eruditely narrated by Shridar Mani and accompanied by pianist Samuel King, offered so much more about its interesting and often scandalous history.

It all began with castrati, young males surgically emasculated to retain pure unbroken voices allied with muscular heft. German composer Giacomo Meyerbeer’s Il Crociato in Egitto (The Crusader in Egypt) of 1824 was the last opera to cast a castrato in a lead role. Armando’s aria Oh come rapida fuggi la speme was beautifully sung by Korean soprano Renata Hann, opening the evening on a pristine high.

Then came the lives of four historical sopranos, famed for their ability to sing like men, effectively replacing the castrati. Giuditta Pasta was responsible for two major roles, Gaetano Donizetti’s Anna Bolena (Anne Boleyn) and Vincenzo Bellini’s Norma.

Photo: Moonrise Studio

The dramatic duet Sul suo capo with French soprano Serine de Labaume and Malaysian mezzo-soprano Samantha Chong portraying Anne with her lady-in-waiting (and queenly successor) Jane Seymour was a touching display of sympathy between rivals. Here the acting also matched the singing.

Hann had the honour of singing bel canto’s most famous aria, Casta Diva from Norma, and she did so spotlessly. She was joined by Chong as fellow Druid priestess Adalgisa in the memorable duet Mira, O Norma, where their voices separated by the interval of a third was perfectly balanced on a knife edge before a race to the finish.

Photo: Moonrise Studio

Soprano Giulia Grisi was responsible for the role of Elvira in Bellini’s I Puritani, whose mad scene Qui la voce saw Labaume skillfully shift vocal gears from slow lament to outright rave. Norina from Donizetti’s Don Pasquale was also created for her, and the duet Pronto io son with baritone Martin Ng in a cameo as Malatesta provided the evening’s precious moments of comedy.

The final two historical sopranos were sisters Maria Malibran and Pauline Viardot, daughters of the fanatical Spanish tenor and vocal pedagogue Manuel Garcia. Both were represented by Desdemona’s Willow Song from Gioachino Rossini’s Otello, its G minor melancholy with harp-like accompaniment lovingly captured by Hann. Chong accounted for O mio Fernando from Donizetti’s La Favorita which brought the concert to a satisfying close.

Before that, all three lady singers were united in the dramatic finale of Act 1 of Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda (Mary Stuart) in a final climactic clash of queens and divas. One goes to the chopping block but not without making a big song and dance about it.

Photo: Moonrise Studio

A CHRISTMAS RHAPSODY / International Festival Chorus / Review

 

A CHRISTMAS RHAPSODY 

International Festival Chorus 

SOTA Concert Hall 

Sunday (8 December 2024) 

It all started with a concert of Christmas music in 1974, after which British music educator John Edwards, Head of Music at the United World College of Southeast Asia (UWCSEA), decided to turn his choir into a permanent entity. Named the International Festival Chorus (IFC), it became Singapore’s longest running community choir, even predating the Singapore Symphony Chorus by some six years. Edwards (who was also The Straits Times’ music reviewer) was the IFC’s longest serving director (he left Singapore in 1983), and past directors have included Robert Casteels, Peter Stead, Eng Meng Chia, Albert Tay and Chong Wai Lun, just to name a few. 

IFC celebrated its 50th anniversary this year with a Christmas concert under its 17th music director the American Tom Anderson. And what an enjoyable and eclectic mix the 140-minute concert was, featuring what must be the most cosmopolitan and diverse choirs performing for the most cosmopolitan and diverse audience in Singapore. The singers of the IFC main chorus, chamber chorus and UWC Children’s Choir (Jamee Guerra, Director) all knew how to have fun in an informal and unstuffy atmosphere that is often lacking here. 

The concert’s first half was occupied with seasonal favourites, opening with the children in It Feels Like Christmas accompanied by pianist Francesca Lee (also IFC’s longest serving member). It was all plain good fun, with the children merrily waving to their parents in the audience after each song. The IFC singers, wearing red scarves and ties on black, were no less festive, registering with Ding Dong! Merrily On High (accompanied by piano four hands) and Chuck Bridwell’s Nutcracker Jingles, a very nifty arrangement combining James Pierpoint’s perennial Jingle Bells with movements from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker ballet. The highly rhythmic African Noel was accompanied by percussionists from the Magnificat Orchestra. 

When it came to the more traditional songs, the chamber chorus delivered with precision and accuracy, In Dulci Jubilo and Es ist ein Ros ensprungen had that glow of warmth while Greg Gilpin’s Ding-a Ding Ding benefited from intimate tintinnabulation and that decrescendo could be heard all the way from the highest circle seats. Handel’s Messiah had to feature sometime, and it was Glory To God with soprano Renata Hann delivering the recitative. Norwegian composer Ola Gjeilo’s Ecce Novum, accompanied by piano and strings, is destined to be a future classic. It is just that beautiful. The Austrian cradle song Still, Still, Still, arranged by Norman Luboff, was sensitively accompanied by Bianca Beng’s harp. 

It was a return to popular music, with Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You, and Tom Anderson (wearing a top hat) had a ravishing cameo solo as Willy Wonka in Pure Imagination, the sumptuously orchestrated version being a particular highlight. The children returned for This Is My Wish and the first half closed with the full complement of singers in Do You Hear What I Hear? 

The concert’s main event was Sir John Rutter’s Magnificat (1990). For creating some of contemporary choral music’s most treacly sweet confections, the poor Knight of the British Empire (he was decorated by King Charles III earlier this year) has received criticism from high snobdom while laughing all the way to the bank. His music is a guilty pleasure, like a high-calorie, high-cholesterol cheese cake with all the fruits and icing on top. And why not? 

The Magnificat Orchestra, formed by some of Singapore’s best free-lancers and a full complement of brass, did the honours to ensure the singers had the best accompaniment ever, and the final result was a veritable treat. The Magnificat subject was Virgin Mary’s joyous response to the annunciation (that she would bear the saviour of the world, impregnated by the Holy Spirit). The high spirits evident in the opening Magnificat anima mea (My soul doth magnify the Lord) with the sopranos in their element. The purity of their voices is celebrated here. More sober was Of a Rose, a Lovely Rose that followed, the only non-liturgical movement and sung in English. Sopranos again ruled, this time with a unison of silky evenness. Quia fecit mihi magna (Because He has done great things for me) had that broad celebratory feel, with men’s voices, not to be overshadowed, taking the lead. 

Soprano Renata Hann returned as an ethereal soloist in Et Misericordia and Esurientes, her amplified voice was a pleasure to behold even if a slight miscue caught on microphone was a small price to pay. Inserted in between, Rutter’s Fecit potentiam took on an unexpectedly syncopated edge, with a jazzy fugue to challenge the singers, which they accomplished with suitable aplomb. The final Gloria Patri provided a suitably grand conclusion with all voices on deck, a reprise of the Magnificat melody and blaring brass to complete the festivities. 

The Magnificat’s forty-minutes or so passed like a dream. Sacred choral music was never meant to be boring or uninvolving, and IFC emphatically confounded all hoary stereotypes with this lively performance. Never mind if the audience applauded between every movement. If there was a work (in effect seven separate works) that deserved multiple plaudits, this was it and the guilt is purely and unreservedly ours. Tom Anderson and his charges have ensured all who attended went home to a blessed and fulfilling Christmas season (with proverbial chestnuts roasting on an open fire) ahead.

RIGOLETTO / New Opera Singapore / Review

 

RIGOLETTO 

New Opera Singapore 

Victoria Theatre 

Sunday (18 August 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 20 August 2024 with the title "NOS puts on snappy staging of Rigoletto".

Western opera is in such a parlous state of state funding in Singapore these days such that the only fully staged opera production of the year was Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto (1851) presented by New Opera Singapore (NOS). Despite being one of the Italian’s most popular operas (after La Traviata and Aida), one has to go as far back at 1993 for its last production here. 

That was during the fledgling years of Singapore Lyric Theatre, fronted by conductor Lim Yau and the late producer Leow Siak Fah, where setting Rigoletto in stylish Shanghai of the 1920s was both audacious and creative. This latest production directed by NOS founder Jeong Ae Ree and conducted by her husband Chan Wei Shing was more traditional but no less edgy. 

A more contemporary noir setting with hints of Italian mafioso elements coloured this sorry tale of curses and vendettas. The hunchbacked court jester Rigoletto has been cursed, and as he vainly protects his secret daughter Gilda from the clutches of the lascivious Duke of Mantua, he dooms her instead. There were three shows featuring three different casts, and the final evening was none too shabby. 

Photo: New Opera Singapore

Front and centre was Korean baritone Min Seung Kang as the eponymous anti-hero, whose bitterness in life was as pronounced as his limp. He was the perfect antithesis to Korean soprano Renata Hann, whose Gilda was purity and innocence personified in her pure lilywhite dress. Her fateful mistake was being self-sacrificial for someone as unworthy as the Duke. 

That smarmy antagonist was sung by Latvian tenor Martins Smaukstelis, whose suaveness came through in the hit arias Questa o Quella (This Woman Or That) and La Donna e Mobile (Women Are Fickle). More important were the duets involving Hann and both men, which were heartrending and totally believable. She herself hit all the high notes in Caro Nome (Sweet Name), a favourite of coloratura sopranos. 

Photo: New Opera Singapore

Another highlight was the final act’s famous quartet Bella Figlia dell’Amore (Fairest Daughter Of Love), with mezzo-soprano Carolyn Holt’s Maddelena making the foursome, where the Duke’s infidelity is exposed to both Rigoletto and Gilda. 

The supporting roles were well cast, with cheap assassin Sparafucile (he charges 20 dollars a kill but operates a Harley?) portrayed by Fionn O hAlmhain attired as a biker, Shaun Lee (Borsa), Cai Xiaofeng (Count), Li Yang (Countess), Stefan Szkafarowsky (Monterone) and Jasmine Towndrow (Giovanna), a truly cosmopolitan team. 

Photo: New Opera Singapore

The choir led by Chong Wai Lun provided mostly light-hearted relief, the men donning masks as voyeurs and kidnappers being particularly comedic. The set and lighting design was simple but effective by setting the boundaries between groups of singers, making small spaces seem like fair distances. It took little for the storm / lightning scene leading to the opera’s fatal end to suggest bad weather and bad karma. 

Director Jeong Ae Ree and
Conductor Chan Wei Shing take their bows.

Ultimately, the story-telling through music was direct, well-paced and nothing was left to drag. All in all, a very successful outing for NOS, which could more than just tip the scales for a shout of being Singapore’s leading opera company today.