Gary Cooper conducts ETO's Seraglio
01 May 2007
Mozart's Die Entfhürung aus dem Serail & English Touring Opera
GARY COOPER
Mozartian bite and bounce
… when Gary Cooper takes the podium for The Seraglio, the same band has Mozartian bite and bounce … this delightful production shows exactly how to do it.
Geoff Brown, The Times
Pasha Selim is at once a stern master and a generous lord – and strangely attractive to his captive, the virtuous Constanza. When her Spanish lover returns to steal her back from the harem, their escape is frustrated – with surprising (even transforming) results for all of them.
English Touring Opera’s new production, performed in colourful period costumes, features some of the most exciting emerging talent in the country: sopranos Elizabeth Donovan and Lorina Gore, tenors Hal Cazalet and Joshua Ellicott, and Welsh bass Sion Goronwy. Richard Jackson, a superb interpreter of lieder and opera, performs the speaking role of the Pasha.
Renowned period conductor and performer Gary Cooper, whose recording of all Mozart’s Piano Variations will be released later this year, conducts the ETO orchestra. Irish Director Gavin Quinn’s recent credits include an acclaimed production of The Playboy of the Western World at Dublin Abbey Theatre – performed by a Chinese cast in Mandarin! – and ETO’s (Little) Magic Flute.
Mozart's marvellous score … busting out all over with youthful exuberance. Gary Cooper's sparkling conducting did it justice.
Michael Church, The Independent
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