14 Friday May 27 2022 | the timesfirst night
subtitled “One crazy day”, and here
masters and servants alike want to
spend the full 24 hours in pursuit of
lust, from daytime frolics to trysts in
the lapis-blue twilight. What are the
cast jiving to as the party begins and
shadows lengthen along the Moorish
tiles of Christopher Oram’s gorgeous
sets? Donna Summer’s I Feel Love
would be a plausible choice...
The set-up needs voluptuous
performances and it gets plenty here.
Giancarlo Andretta’s conducting
doesn’t shout about itself, but the
London Philharmonic Orchestra
produce detailed, languid phrasing
and, if Andretta fell in and out of time
with the leading lady — Amanda
Woodbury’s Countess, whose arias fall
earthbound — he finds lovely details in
the score. It’s romantic and persuasive.
This Countess is seemingly quite
happy to revenge-cuckold her husband,
and she’d have ample reason afterhearing Emily Pogorelc, as Cherubino,
perform a disarming Voi che sapete.
You can add to that showstopper Hera
Hyesang Park’s pellucid Deh vieni: as
Susanna, the Korean soprano is
charming and her characterisation is
more considered than her Despina in
Glyndebourne’s Così last year. Rosie
Aldridge’s warmly appealing, non-
caricatured Marcellina is another hit.
Yet the tension of any Figaro would
collapse if the two rival stags, Figaro
and the Count, weren’t evenly
matched. They are excellently cast
here — and extravagantly bewigged,
shaggy Seventies-style. Brandon
Cedel’s warmly sung Figaro has a nice
touch of vulnerability to add to his
imposing stature; Germán Olvera has
the dance moves of the alpha male
and vocal prowess to match it. Sit back
and watch the fireworks.
Neil Fisher
To July 16, glyndebourne.comE
ven Count Almaviva, with the
racy sports car he flashes in
Michael Grandage’s 2012
staging of The Marriage of
Figaro, would have been
thwarted by the M25 meltdown that
preceded curtain-up on the first night
of this revival and which led to your
correspondent missing part of Act I.
However, if there is a sun-kissed,
disco-dancing show guaranteed to
dispel road rage, it’s this one. It’s true
that Grandage’s staging, revived again
by Ian Rutherford, doesn’t probe too
deeply into the emotional pain or
social satire that Mozart and da Ponte
put on a knife-edge. But it would be
unfair to call it unperceptive, and at
its best it’s infectious.
It’s the 1970s, and the Almaviva
household have fled soaring inflation
and political turbulence and gone to
their swanky villa for the summer.
Beaumarchais’ original play wasHera Hyesang Park
and Germán Olvera
at GlyndebourneLe nozze di
Figaro
Glyndebourne
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good album — so good that Styles
played it in full. Its big song, As It Was,
is an ode to impermanence destined
to become his definitive solo hit.
Effortless glamour with a melancholic
undertow — that’s why he has gone
down so well in the post-Covid era.
The album was released last week,
yet many of the crowd were already
word-perfect. “I never thought I’d say
‘cocaine side boob’ with my mother
in the audience,” Styles said after the
California-breezy Keep Driving.
The gossamer funk of Cinema was
a highlight, and the chat was as
smooth as the singing. “Did anyone
get rained on? I’m so sorry. I don’t
control the rain,” Styles said, as if that
were a possibility. Later he stopped
Sign of the Times so that a fan who had
fainted could get attention. Maybe
the hype is warranted. For the encore,
Styles nodded to the One Direction
days with What Makes You Beautiful
and the inevitable Watermelon Sugar.
No matter how bad things get, he said
of the latter, “you can always sing
along to a song about oral sex”. They
did. And somehow it wasn’t weird.
Ed Potton
Radio 1’s Big Weekend, Coventry,
Sunday; Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow,
June 11; touring to June 19. This
review appeared in some editions
Harry Styles at Brixton — a lounge lizard without the sleaze on WednesdayS
uddenly everybody loves
Harry Styles. He had a decent
portion of the globe onside
after his transition from
One Direction moppet to
androgynous solo charmer. Now he
has won over oldies with a new album,
Harry’s House — with folk-pop and
soft-rock referencing Joni Mitchell and
Fleetwood Mac — and has beguiled
parents with a CBeebies bedtime story.
Worth £100 million at 28, Prince Harry
is dangerously close to becoming king.Has the hype outstripped the talent?
Not by much. His greatest asset is his
serenity. There was plenty of pressure
on this relatively small show, but you
wouldn’t have known it. Styles is
a lounge lizard without the sleaze.
Dance moves were mainly restrained.
Did his pulse go above 80?
Arriving to an avalanche of young
female screams, he wore a spotted top
and white trousers, and was backed by
a band in pink jumpsuits and a set
designed to look like — what else? —
the front of a house. His voice, or what
you could hear above the crowd, was
caramel-like on the weightless opener,
Music for a Sushi Restaurant.
As well as having all the right
influences, Harry’s House is a reallyHarry Styles
O2 Academy Brixton, SW9
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A serene, stylish
charmer: hail
Prince Harry
LLOYD WAKEFIELD; BILL COOPER