Orfeo review – descent to the underworld takes you to heaven

Garsington Opera, Wormsley Estate, Stokenchurch
John Caird delivers a triumphant fusion of staging, choreography and performance – with Ed Lyon formidably assured in the title role

Sometimes everything comes right in the theatre. You know it when it happens, and Garsington Opera’s Orfeo is such a moment. It helped that the Chilterns weather was so benign for the summer season opening, but the real achievement belonged squarely to the performers and to director John Caird’s production team.

Monteverdi’s “fable in music” of 1607 tells the story of Orpheus and Eurydice in a psychologically intense musical word painting that is poised between the madrigal era and that of baroque opera. Caird’s beautifully deft production, with designs by Robert Jones and lighting by Paul Pyant, creates a pastoral Arcadian vision before tragedy strikes, and a shadowy underworld as Orpheus makes his doomed pursuit of the dead Eurydice.

Orfeo is at Garsington Opera until 3 July.

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