Holland Park | Tuesday 2nd June – Saturday 1st August
Opera Holland Park is one of the most popular and highly-acclaimed events in London’s musical calendar and their 19th season includes a mixture of five new productions and revivals in 36 main-stage public performances. The City of London Sinfonia will accompany all these productions for their 12th year as house orchestra. A particular highlight is the first-ever professional London performance of Jonathan Dove’s contemporary opera Flight.
Supporting its aims to make opera more accessible, OHP is pleased to continue its two free ticket schemes alongside the £17 Inspire seats with approximately 1,000 free seats for Young People and 450 free seats for those over 60. OHP have also introduced a new pricing structure with some seating category prices reduced by 28% since 2014.
The season opens with Puccini’s powerful Il trittico. These three one-act operas portray a diverse spectrum of human emotion; the heartbreak and tragedy of Suor Angelica, the terror and jealousy of Tabarro’s murder and the comedy of Gianni Schicchi suffused with the darker side of human nature (a revival of OHP’s 2012 production). It is hard to imagine many more potent theatrical experiences.
Jonathon Dove’s Flight is a warm, honest and funny opera based on a true story of a refugee trapped and living at a major international airport. The music is gloriously melodic, inventive and accessible. Flight – funny, touching and life affirming as it is – has become one of the most popular and performed British operas in recent decades. One of the great operas of the 19th Century, Aida is more than an epic procession: the choruses, scale and the perception are countered by a deeply intimate final dénouement. The opera has its Kings, Princesses and High Priests but, at the final reckoning, the frailty of individual human nature is the most powerful image we are left with. Verdi gave his masterwork some of the greatest choruses and arias of the era and it is rare for this opera to receive productions at houses in London. This is a new production and its debut at Opera Holland.
Delibes’ Lakmé is perhaps best known for the flower duet, used for many years in a well-known airline’s advertisement. It is beautifully balanced from a musical point of view, has real heartbreak at its centre and belongs in the stable of opera that absorbed influences from the orient and developed this exoticism into high art. The opera remains a relative rarity in London and OHP are excited to stage this new production. The performance on Monday 27th July sees the return of the highly successful Christine Collins Young Artists to the OHP stage. This year, 16 named roles across the season are taken by past participants of the Christine Collins Young Artists scheme.
OHP’s 2007 production of Italo Montemezzi’s masterpiece, L’amore dei tre Re, returns to the stage this summer. This is a scintillating 90 minutes of drama, passion, murderous rage, jealousy and ultimately noble forgiveness and sacrifice. It leaves audiences devastated. This production is widely regarded as one of the best ever staged at OHP and is not to be missed.
After the huge success of OHP’s first ever commissioned family opera, composed by Will Todd, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland will return once again to the Yucca Lawn in Holland Park. Tickets are priced at just £5 for children and £10 for adults. Performed in this woodland setting, the production sees viewers promenade between the eye-catching sets accompanied by the singers and the ‘Alice Band’.
In 2015, Opera Holland Park also welcomes back The Luna Cinema for four classic films in August.
OHP is also proud to announce that Investec Wealth & Investment will continue as principal sponsor for a further two seasons.