Bampton Classical Opera 2024

BAMPTON CLASSICAL OPERA 2024 SEASON

Giuseppe Gazzaniga, L’isola d’Alcina – Alcina’s Island (1772)

Performances:

The Deanery Garden, Bampton, Oxfordshire: Friday 19, Saturday 20 July

Westonbirt School, Gloucestershire: Monday 26 August

The Barn at Old Walland, Wadhurst, Sussex: Saturday 31 August

St John’s Smith Square, London: Friday 13 September

understanding of chemistry who somehow concocts a powerful laxative, to be praised in one of Haydn’s jauntiest arias.  Meanwhile Grilletta is also wooed by the foppish Volpino, whose mastery of disguise leads to a finale of delightful silliness.

Bampton Classical Opera has taken a lead in presenting Haydn’s neglected operas to new audiences and has staged six with great success, including last season’s much-praised production of 'Fool Moon' (Il mondo della luna).  'The Apothecary' is one of his earliest surviving performable operas.  With its simple but witty plot, the opera demonstrates the composer’s delight in exploring bizarre situations and creating affectionately humorous music.

The Manor House garden opens for riverside picnics from 2pm. If wet, the performance will take place in Dorchester Abbey.

Tickets are £45 (to include priority seating and a post-performance reception) or £25, and are available online.

Bampton Classical Opera stages productions in rural venues in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire as well as regularly in London at St John’s Smith Square.  Other significant venues and festivals have included Wigmore Hall and Purcell Room, Buxton Festival, Cheltenham Festival and Theatre Royal Bath.  Eschewing familiar repertoire, Bampton concentrates instead on rarities from the late eighteenth century, sung in lively new English translations, and has given many enterprising performances of forgotten operas.  Amongst these have been UK premières of Bertoni Orfeo, Marcos Portugal The Marriage of Figaro, Paer Leonora, Benda Romeo and Juliet, Gluck Il Parnaso confuso, Philemon and Baucis and Salieri Falstaff and La fiera di Venezia. 

Bampton Classical Opera was a finalist in the Rediscovered Opera category of the 2020 International Opera Awards for Stephen Storace Gli sposi malcontenti (Bride and Gloom), and last year’s production of Salieri La fiera di Venezia (At the Venice Fair) was shortlisted for the 2023 Awards. 

www.bamptonopera.org

The delightful Deanery Garden at Bampton provides a charming and picturesque venue for open-air opera, with an excellent natural acoustic.  Westonbirt School is a spectacular Victorian mansion, with extensive Grade I listed gardens: the performances take place in the Orangery Theatre.  Audiences are encouraged to bring their own garden chairs to Bampton and enjoy a pre-performance or interval picnic.  The Barn at Old Walland is a traditional Sussex threshing barn set in the Wealden Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty: it was recently converted into an intimate performing space.

St John’s Smith Square is the most historic of London’s concert halls and provides an outstanding and appropriately eighteenth-century setting for this performance. 

‘Alcina’s Island’ performances, with free pre-performance talks:                    

The Deanery Garden, Bampton OX18 2LL

7.00 pm Friday 19 and Saturday 20 July

The Orangery Theatre, Westonbirt School, near Tetbury, Gloucestershire GL8 8QG

5.00 pm Monday 26 August

The Barn at Old Walland, Wadhurst, East Sussex TN5 6LU

6.30 pm Saturday 31 August

St John’s Smith Square, London SW1P 3HA

7.00 pm Friday 13 September

Booking Information, Bampton, Westonbirt and Wadhurst

Tickets for Bampton and Westonbirt: £42 (under 18: half-price)

Tickets for Wadhurst: £85 (includes an optional £20 donation to the British Red Cross)

By Telephone: 01993 851142

Online: www.bamptonopera.org                  

Booking information, St John’s Smith Square