Autumn 2010
English Touring Opera will produce and tour two operas setting texts by famous playwrights: Promised End (a setting of Shakespear’s King Lear edited by Frank Kermode with music by Alexander Goehr), a new opera, and The Duenna, an 18th century opera with a text by Irish playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan (author of The School for Scandal and The Rivals) that was probably the most popular and profitable opera ever produced in England.
King Lear is the greatest of ‘family’ dramas, in which a king mistakes the fine words of two of his daughters for love and respect, and mistakes the plainspoken, loving words of his third daughter for contempt. At the same time his vassal the Earl of Gloucester makes a similar misjudgement of his sons. The terrible disappointment and suffering that ensues takes these two old men to the naked edge of their endurance, and causes them to pose stark questions about justice, love, and bare humanity.
Alexander Goehr is a composer of international renown. His operas have been performed all over the world after premieres in places like the Royal Opera House, the Hamburg Opera, and [see note]. Frank Kermode is one of the greatest living Shakespearean scholars, and a distinguished writer and critic in his own right.
Click here to hear some of Goehr’s music.
The Duenna is an utterly contrasting work, full of sparkling wit and musical charm. It too is concerned with fathers who are deceived in their daughters, but in this case our sympathies are all with the daughters, who are seeking to marry men of their own choice. Knowing that Sheridan eloped with the beautiful Elizabeth Linley against the will of her father (one of the composers of The Duenna), and that he never entirely abandoned the rakish behaviour his father-in-law so dreaded, makes this operatic double elopement a particularly savoury dish. Tuneful, sabre-tongued, light-hearted and irreverent, The Duenna is the jewel of Georgian England, almost forgotten now.
| October 2010 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fri 1 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Lighthouse, Poole | Box office: 0844 406 8666 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 2 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Lighthouse, Poole | Box office: 0844 406 8666 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 9 | 7.45pm | Promised End | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Mon 11 | 7.45pm | Promised End | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Wed 13 | 7.00pm | The Duenna | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Thu 14 | 7.45pm | Promised End | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Fri 15 | 7.00pm | The Duenna | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 16 | 1.00pm | The Duenna | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 16 | 7.45pm | Promised End | Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, London | Box office: 020 7304 4000 | Booking Closed |
| Mon 18 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Theatre Royal Bath | Box office: 01225 448844 | Booking Closed |
| Tue 19 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Theatre Royal Bath | Box office: 01225 448844 | Booking Closed |
| Thu 21 | 7.30pm | Promised End | Malvern Theatres | Box office: 01684 892277 | Booking Closed |
| Fri 22 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Malvern Theatres | Box office: 01684 892277 | Booking Closed |
| Tue 26 | 7.30pm | Promised End | De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill | Box office: 01424 229 111 | Booking Closed |
| Wed 27 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill | Box office: 01424 229 111 | Booking Closed |
| Fri 29 | 7.30pm | Promised End | Exeter Northcott | Box office: 01392 493 493 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 30 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Exeter Northcott | Box office: 01392 493 493 | Booking Closed |
| November 2010 | |||||
| Mon 1 | 7.30pm | Promised End | The Hawth, Crawley | Box office: 01293 553636 | Booking Closed |
| Wed 3 | 7.30pm | Promised End | Cambridge Arts Theatre | Box office: 01223 503333 | Booking Closed |
| Thu 4 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Cambridge Arts Theatre | Box office: 01223 503333 | Booking Closed |
| Fri 5 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Cambridge Arts Theatre | Box office: 01223 503333 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 6 | 7.30pm | Promised End | Cambridge Arts Theatre | Box office: 01223 503333 | Booking Closed |
| Mon 8 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Harrogate Theatre | Box office: 01423 502 116 | Booking Closed |
| Fri 26 | 7.30pm | Promised End | Snape Maltings Concert Hall | Box office: 01728 687 110 | Booking Closed |
| Sat 27 | 7.30pm | The Duenna | Snape Maltings Concert Hall | Box office: 01728 687 110 | Booking Closed |