This month ... June - Scottish Opera

La fanciulla del Festival

Our first operatic outing of the season takes us to the Edinburgh International Festival for a concert performance of Puccini’s La fanciulla del West at the Usher Hall. Our Music Director Francesco Corti conducts this one-off performance of perhaps the only Wild West-set opera, featuring the biggest orchestration of all Puccini’s work, a stellar cast and the fantastic Edinburgh Festival Chorus.

Caledonian Carmen

Our season proper opens with a new touring production of Carmen, which kicks off at Glasgow’s Citizens Theatre in early September, before heading off around Scotland, visiting 22 venues from Dumfries to Kirkwall and everywhere in between. The production will feature both chamber orchestra and piano-accompanied performances and transfers the action to the heat of 1960s Spain.

The Fantastic Mr Figaro!

Our first big production is Mozart’s unstoppable masterpiece The Marriage of Figaro, which opens in Glasgow in October before touring to Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Inverness. Sir Thomas Allen, who was at the helm of 2007’s highly acclaimed The Barber of Seville, returns to direct this colourful, sensual production, set in the late 18th century.

Booking opens 28 June.

Rare Gems

Next up we present two operas that haven’t been performed by Scottish Opera for a quarter of a century: Handel’s passionate Orlando and Richard Strauss’s lively Intermezzo, which marks a return to German repertoire, the first for the company since 2006. These two will be in Glasgow and Edinburgh next spring.

Italian Inspiration

Our last opera of the season is Verdi’s classic Rigoletto, in a production first staged in New Zealand in 2005. We welcome back Tobias Ringborg who conducted 2009’s luscious Così fan tutte. Rigoletto features Emerging Artist Nadine Livingston in the role of Gilda, hot on the heels of singing Musetta in our current La bohème, and Susanna in our forthcoming Figaro.

Also featuring...

The new season also includes a host of special events and collaborations. Look out for Club Noir A Night at the Opera – a one-off night of burlesque, cabaret and opera at the Edinburgh Fringe; Janáĉek’s The Cunning Little Vixen, our annual collaboration with the RSAMD; and a new collaboration with the Citizens Theatre to present a world premiere for families – Dr Ferret’s Bad Medicine Roadshow.