LUCIA DI LAMUR
The Creative Sync
SOTA Drama Theatre
Saturday (31 October 2026)
THE SUPERNATURAL IN OPERA
Lirica Arts
Esplanade Recital Studio
Sunday (1 November 2026)
This review was published in The Straits Times on 2 November 2026 with the title "Supernatural songs add thrills to Creative Sync and Lirica Arts' Halloween concerts".
It is Halloween night, and ghouls are about. A pale Water Ghost, played by Sonia Kwek, stalked the stage of Lucia di Lamur, a retelling of Gaetano Donizetti’s 1835 opera Lucia di Lammermoor by The Creative Sync. In this production sung in Italian directed by Su-Yin Mah, the original setting of Scottish lowlands was transported to a kampung in 1950s Malaya.
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| Photos: Amin Khairoodin |
Lucia, sung by soprano Wendy Woon, is in love with tenor Alan Lau’s Edgardo, an enemy of her family and is violently opposed by her brother Enriko, helmed by baritone Kong Lingyi. Her forced marriage to the hammy Arturo (tenor Leslie Tay) sends her into a deathly spiral resulting in wedding bed mariticide and the opera’s famous mad scene.
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| Photo: Amin Khairoodin |
In the absence of an orchestra, pianist Vincent Chen provided vivid accompaniment, as did executive director Hunter Mah’s guitar in pivotal moments including replacing the flute solo of the mad scene. Woon’s was a coloratura role which hit the high spots, including Act One’s Regnava nel silenzio (Reign of Silence) and the final act’s Il dolce suono (The Sweet Sound) leading into the blood-splattered Spargi d’amaro pianto (Cast On My Grave A Flower).
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| Photo: Amin Khairoodin |
This production is to be lauded for its dark and atmospheric visual elements, cleverly employing film (Lucia running from her fate) and photography (a Malay village from an antique painting as backdrop). Act Two’s highlight was the Sextet, which had all six singers’ images and English transliterations projected behind them.
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How this idyllic Malay painting got
transformed into the set's backdrop. |
Enhancing this production was an informative exhibition on the production’s Malay influences, including P.Ramlee pontianak movies and sarong fabrics worn by the cast. The audience was also plied with Nyonya kuehs, local drinks and sweets. It’s trick or treat, after all.
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| Photo: Chris P.Lim |
The diabolical theme continued into Lirica Arts’ lecture-recital The Supernatural In Opera, part of its Opera 101 series that demystifies the art-form. Researched and presented by local baritone Daniel Fong, ten operatic excerpts featuring demons, fairies, vampires, witches and the occult were celebrated.
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| Photo: Chris P.Lim |
Selling your soul to the devil was a popular plot device of the Romantic era, represented by Johann Goethe’s Faust, so what better way to open with the final scene of Charles Gounod’s Faust? Chinese soprano Xiong Yufei (Marguerite), local tenor Shaun Lee (Faust) and Taiwanese bass-baritone Guan-Ming Chen (Mephistopheles) brilliantly carried off this spiritual tug-of-war between salvation and damnation accompanied by pianist Beatrice Lin.
The devil is more a seductive muse than outright menace, which Chen aptly showed in Voici des roses (Here Are Roses) from Hector Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust. Xiong stole the show in her arias portraying fairies and sprites in Ninfe! Elfi! from Giuseppe Verdi’s Falstaff and the famous Song to the Moon from Antonin Dvorak’s Rusalka.
In an imperious show of prurient glee and bloodlust, local baritone and Lirica Arts founder Martin Ng leered and sneered in Ha, noch ein ganzen Tag (Ha, Another Whole Day) from Heinrich Marschner’s The Vampire. One did not need the words to know his intent. Tenor Lee also made his presence felt in The Fatal Vow from Carl Maria von Weber’s Oberon, sung in English.
The last singer was Thai mezzosoprano Kridhima Siriwattanakamol, who created a stir by going full-goth in all-black. A stunning stage presence with a voice to match served her well in villainess roles. In the Witch’s Aria from Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, Du wilde Seherin (You Wild Sorceress, in duet with Ng) from Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin, Jezibaba’s Aria from Dvorak’s Rusalka and Re del abisso (King of the Abyss) from Giuseppe Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera, her Singapore debut will not be easily forgotten.
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| Photos: Chris P.Lim |
