Wexford Festival: Il viaggio a Reims
National Opera House (O’Reilly Theatre), Wexford; 25/10/2025
The Wexford Festival Orchestra Ensemble, Manuel Hartinger (conductor); Forooz Razavi, Maria Matthews, Jane Burnell, Sarah Shine & Laura Aherne (sopranos); Helen Stanley & Valeria Gorbunova (mezzo-sopranos); Yu Shao, Seán Tester & Gabe Clarke (tenors); David Kennedy & Tong Guo (baritones); Cerys MacAllister (soprano); Agshin Khudaverdiyev (bass); Ihor Mostovoi & Seamus Brady (baritones); Joshua McCullough (bass-baritone); Conor Prendiville (tenor); Rory Lynch (tenor); Meilir Jones (bass-baritone); Loughlin Deegan (WFO Interim Executive Director).
This sixth report from this year’s Wexford Festival Opera covers the second of the two Factory Operas, featuring vocal artists from the Wexford Factory career development programme for young artists. In its 200th-anniversary, Rossini’s final opera in the Italian language, ‘Il viaggio a Reims’ (The Journey to Reims), rediscovered and brought back to life in 1983, is revived in a new WFO production, directed by WFO Artistic Director Rosetta Cucchi, showcasing current and former talent from the Factory project. The original was written as a cantata to celebrate the coronation of French King Charles X in Reims in May 1825, equally showcasing a collection of the greatest singers of Rossini’s time, with a fairly thin plot contrived to do just that, with more than enough chaotic hilarity to grab an audience, as follows. A group of uppercrust Europeans are en route to join in the French coronation festivities for which the opera was written. These prestigious guests have been staying in a spa hotel (L’Albergo del Giglio d’Oro – The Golden Lily Hotel) on their way to Reims, where the celebration will take place. When the day arrives, there are no horses available to pull their coaches. When they discover that, following the coronation, the King will return to Paris they decide, instead of trying to get to Reims, to have a grand banquet and travel to Paris the following day. In the ensuing party, all the illustrious wealthy guests do a star turn, celebrating national pride and international amity. In Rosetta’s adaptation, The Golden Lily is a mental health clinic for wealthy clients, all eccentric, obsessive and / borderline delusional (on which side of that border ever moot). They are all supposedly ‘cured’ and due to attend an event which will boost the reputation of the Clinic, but tickets are not available until the following day. The thinner the plot, the easier to adapt. The Wexford Festival Orchestra Ensemble is conducted by Manuel Hartinger, who has adapted the score for reduced forces and a single act of about 100 minutes duration. The costumes are by Massimo Carlotto and the lighting is by Paolo Bonapace. The adaptation is sung in Italian with English surtitles. I caught the performance of 25th October.
Characters and casting was as follows. Madame Cortese, owner/director of the clinic, eager to boost its reputation and anxious that the travel arrangements are going pear-shaped (Iranian soprano Forooz Razavi, joined the Factory from Opera for Peace); Contessa di Folleville, a young hypochondriac French widow obsessed with her extensive wardrobe, which has gone missing in transit (British/Irish Soprano Jane Burnell); Modestina, a nurse assigned solely to her treatment as the most important patient (Irish soprano Maria Matthews, a super Adina in last year’s community Factory opera, Donizetti’s ‘Elixir of Love’); Corinna, believing herself to be a famous Roman poetess (Irish soprano Laura Aherne, recently joined Irish National Opera); Lord Sidney, English colonel secretly in love with Corinna;(Azerbaijani bass Agshin Khudaverdiyev); Chevalier Belfiore, handsome young French officer and spare-time painter, companion to the Contessa, but unrequitedly fancies Corinna (Chinese lyric tenor Yu Shao); Marchesa Melibea, remarried Polish widow of an Italian general killed on their wedding night (Russian mezzo-soprano Valeria Gorbunova); Don Alvaro, her new husband, a Spanish Admiral (Irish baritone David Kennedy); Count Libenskof, a Russian general with designs on the Marchesa (Irish tenor Seán Tester); Barone di Trombonok, a German major and music lover who believes himself to be a conductor, dressing as one, carrying a baton and conducting whenever we see him (Northern Irish baritone currently studying at RCS Seamus Brady); Don Profondo, Italian dignitary obsessed with history and antiquities and a friend of Corinna (Ukrainian baritone Ihor Mostovoi); Don Prudenzio, the clinic’s psychiatrist (Scottish bass-baritone Joshua McCullough, who has featured positively in my reviews of RCS MMus Opera productions over the last 2 years); Don Luigino, cousin of the Contessa, who brings the unpleasant news that her wardrobe has been lost (Irish tenor Conor Prendiville); Maddalena, staff member of the clinic from Normandy (Scottish mezzo Helen Stanley); Antonio, staff member (Welsh bass-baritone Meilir Jones, a convincing seer in WFO The Magic Fountain this year); Zefirino, the courier who brings the bad news that the tickets for travel have not materialised (Irish tenor and chorister Rory Lynch); Gelsomino, staff member (tenor Gabe Clarke); 2 other nurses (Irish soprano Cerys MacAllister and baritone Tong Guo). The programme also credits ‘The King’ (who does not appear) as Loughlin Deegan, who is WFO’s Interim Executive Director.
In the course of the action, the various problematic romances and love triangles get sorted out, with Trombonok proving to be a peacemaker, if not a matchmaker, all probably metaphorical of the geopolitics of Rossini’s time and not without a wealth of situation comedy and visual humour. The main clinic set was very reminiscent of that of the upmarket wellness centre in ‘Le maschere’ last year, while a garden set with hedges and stylised flowers for romantic trysts was very pleasing. The concluding celebration of friendship and mutual admiration of nations seemed to chime with the ethos of the Factory, the Festival, the town and the country as a still committed EU member, It did have this Irishman musing on whether this feel-good opera could make any sense in Brexit Britain.
Rossini’s music was as delightful as ever and it drew excellent performances from all of the large cast of characters, far too numerous to mention them all. I shall, therefore, single out just two for special mention, one a memorable first time hearing, the other a welcome second encounter. Iranian soprano Forooz Razavi has a charismatic stage presence and a voice that communicates with nuanced but expressive directness, supported by facial and body visual language, drawing the listener in to a complete experience. Definitely a soprano to watch. After Jane Burnell’s delightful characterisation of Molly Allgood in ‘Lady Gregory in America’ last year, I was looking forward to her Contessa. I was not disappointed. Last year, I wrote: “Jane Burnell’s sweet, clear, unforced soprano voice (in what was a first hearing for me) endows Molly with a radiant benevolence that turns Kerrigan from boy to man. There is something about Jane Burnell’s stage presence that makes the world seem a better place”. Well, that still holds. When the Contessa’s favourite hat is the only thing from her missing wardrobe that is salvaged, her joy is radiant. Jane made sure we all felt it too.
This production of ‘Il viaggio a Reims’ brings more joy into the world. Full marks from me.