17 May 2012

Fizzing opera

Garth Wilshere

22/02/2012 10:33:00 a.m.

Opera In a Days Bay Garden, Alcina (Handel), Producer Rhona Fraser, Conductor – Michael Vinten, Director  – Sara Brodie, Canna House, Days Bay February 11-17, Reviewed by Garth Wilshere.
OPERA in a Days Bay Garden’s third summer venture was Handel’s witty and ironic operatic masterpiece Alcina.
Excellent young singers, a  fine principal NZSO-player, a 14-piece orchestra led by violinist Donald Armstrong, direction from conductor MichaelVinten and director Sara Brodie all in a glorious garden setting. It was a fizzing, feast of imaginative, innovative opera.
The weather behaved and the opera being set on a fantastical enchanted island, with the sea visible from a luxuriant garden, was perfect.
Enchantress Alcina has had many lovers, and the chorus transformed into demented, geriatric creatures with their distinctive crumbling white costumes and silvery-white wigs. The black-suited security guards added menace and atmosphere.
Brodie moved her performers with elegance, style and choreographic grace using the whole garden to excellent effect.
Bradmante (a charismatic Bianca Andrew, disguised as her brother Ricciardo) arrives on the island looking for her husband Ruggierro (Stephen Diaz).With Bradmante is Ruggiero’s former trainer Meliso (Kieran Rayner). They encounter Morgana, Alcina’s sister, played with willowy, fey elegance by Rhona Fraser who instantly falls for the “young man” which incurs rage and jealousy from her lover Oronte (Tom Atkins).
A young boy Oberto deliciously played as a rascally scout by Olga Gryniewicz is looking for his father, transformed by Alcina.
The complicated plot was easy to follow with the excellent diction from all singers.
As a glamorous, Amazon-like, seducing sorceress Bryony Williams commanded the stage as Alcina. She sang brilliantly with power and accuracy.
Counter-tenor Stephen Diaz projected and sang with involvement and passion.
The production sparkled with humour, sensuousness, strength and grit. Orchestra forces could hardly be bettered and the whole was a triumph.

Cover Story

Best of Wellington 2011

Briefs

  • A question of nutrition

    Controversial Washington-based nutritionist Sally Fallon-Morell is to speak in Wellington on March 29.
    Fallon-Morell is the co-founder of the American food lobby group the Weston A. Price Foundation and the author of Nourishing Traditions. She advocates for the consumption of nutritionally dense foods such as lacto-fermented vegetables, stocks and broths, and whole raw dairy products.
    Fallon-Morell will speak at St Patrick’s College Hall on March 29.

  • Relay for cancer

    Organisers say Sunday’s Relay for Life is full to capacity with hundreds of Wellingtonians registered for the event.
    A total of 88 teams, made up of 10 to 500 members, plan to take part with a further 25 teams on the waiting list.
    The 24 hour relay, the Cancer Society’s biggest fundraising event of the year, takes place at Frank Kitts Park from 4pm on March 31.

  • Osteoarthritis awareness

    Arthritis New Zealand has launched a nationwide campaign raise awareness about osteoarthritis. 
    Arthritis is New Zealand’s leading cause of disability, affecting 305,000 adults, and osteoarthritis is its most common form.
    The campaign features television commercials and an interactive website.


  • Wild walk

    Take part in the Big Walk at Zealandia on March 31.
    Walkers can choose a two, five or 10 kilometre walk catering to all fitness levels.
    Money raised will go to the Foundation for Youth Development.

  • School pool

    The opening of the new Khandallah School pool this week means hundreds of children will be able to continue their swimming lessons.
    The pool was the first to receive a grant from Wellington City Council’s Schools Pools Partnership Fund, a fund set up in 2010 to help schools improve their pool facilities.
    Grants from the fund have also been made for pools at Wellington East Girls’ College, Barhampore School and Tawa School.

  • Easter bikers

    Motorcyclists are invited to get on their bikes and collect Easter eggs for families support from the Wellington City Mission.
    The charity run on April 1 is organised by motorcycle lobby group BONZ.
    Eggs can be donated at Red Baron Motorcylces in Alicetown. The registration fee for bikers is $10, plus the cost of Easter eggs.

  • Crafty

    Made on Marion opens on the site of the former Golding Handicrafts site in Marion St, from April 1.  They will continue to supply craft materials.

  • Ze upgrade

    Taranaki Street fuel users will notice that the Z Energy’s former Shell Service Station is closed.  Z are doing a “total revamp”.
    The job will take four weeks.

  • Newlands Moves

    Developer Ayal Aharoni has agreed to build only 90 instead of 220 houses on his six and a half hectares above Ngauranga Gorge in Newlands.  Only low density occupation will be allowed on the remaining 8.4 hectares.


  • Baring Head

    There's a new  draft plan out for what should happen at Baring Head.  It outlines how the Greater Wellington Regional council would like to manage the newest addition to its regional parks network. Grazing animals will go, motorised vehicles will be prohibited, predators will be controlled, and the lighthouse will be preserved. Submissions are invited.


  • It’s a wonder

    A new childcare centre in Newtown says it is dedicated to helping kids grow up healthy in mind, body and spirit. Little Wonders Childcare on Rintoul Street is an independent early childhood education and learning centre, the sixth centre to be opened by its Auckland-based owner. It caters to 100 children aged between three months and five years old and has been open for a little more than seven weeks.

  • Festival treats

    CHILDREN have not been forgotten by organisers of the New Zealand International Arts Festival.
    For a perfect first theatrical experience White tells the story of friends Cotton and Winkle who live in a world where there is no colour and everything is startlingly white. That is until a brightly coloured egg tumbles out of the sky and changes their world for ever.
    White plays at Capital E from March 7-11.
    The tale of Peter and the World also promises to be a magical night for all ages. Sergei Prokofiev’s classic children’s tale is told through film and live music from the NZ Symphony Orchestra at the Michael Fowler Centre on March 9.
    March 11 is Young Writers and Readers Day and readings from children’s writers and illustrators Lynley Dodd and Gavin Bishop.

Reader's Poll

Should TVNZ7 be saved as non-commercial?