National Opera House (O'Reilly Theatre) Wexford 26/10/26
Wexford Festival Opera Ensemble; Andrew Synnott (conductor); Rachael Conaghan, Eilís Dexter (mezzo); Eiméar Harper, Deirdre Higgins, Catherine Hooper (soprano); Seán Tester (tenor); Cuan Durkin, Timothy Mays (baritone); Yasmin O'Reilly, Olha Palazhchenko (mezzo); Éadaoin Hassett, Eva Maria Kavanagh (soprano); Yu Shao (tenor); Matthew Mannion, Fraser Robinson (baritone)
Two years ago at the Wexford Festival, I caught a performance of a one-act commission from composer Alberto Caruso with a libretto by the novelist Colm Tóibín, ‘Lady Gregory in America’. This 75th Anniversary year, the same partnership gave us ‘The First Festival’, another one-acter, set in Wexford 1951 as the first festival is about to start, a feel-good romantic comedy, celebrating love, music, and a town changed forever. The following is the premiss. Four clerks at Wexford County Council’s Motor Taxation Office, two males and two females, arrive for work on a Monday morning, nursing freshly broken hearts. They’ve all been dumped, their dates were disasters, and all four are looking for love. Word arrives that a new opera festival is about to start in town. Meanwhile, four international opera singers arrive in Wexford singing arias of longing and regret. Behind their glamour, they are equally heartbroken and desperate for connection. By opening night, four glorious new romances have blossomed between the townsfolk and the stars. But in 1951 Ireland, privacy is virtually impossible to find - until each of the local clerks hatches the exact same plan: to sneak into the empty Motor Taxation Office after hours. What follows is a night of joyful chaos and soaring song, as music gives eight hopeless romantics their glorious outing in love in October 1951. The scenario offers a broad scope for hilarity, all of which has been fully exploited.
‘The First Festival’ was commissioned specifically to showcase the rising stars of the Wexford Factory programme and so is this year’s ‘Factory Opera’ as distinct from the ‘Community Opera’. With 16 rising stars on the programme (and not 4 of each tessitura either) to distribute over 8 roles, the casting is complex. Unfortunately, the literature supplied does not specify which singers sang in which performances. To be fair, I had been told where evening cast lists are “displayed” (hidden), but forgot to look for it. This is not the first time I’ve faced this issue and I’ll approach it with my customary solution: listing all possibles (above) and proceeding below with my best guess based on what I think I saw. Andrew Synnott conducted the Wexford Festival Opera Ensemble, Conor Hanratty directed, natty 1950s costumes were by Frances White, lighting was by Paolo Bonapace.
Life answering the phones in the Motor Taxation Office is dull. There are stupid questions (“No, madam. We don’t do dog licences”) and Monday after a weekend of disappointment is dreary. In the role of Betty the bossy anglophile office manager, Irish mezzo Eilís Dexter (probably, also in ‘Still, life …’ this year) is, if anything, even more reluctant than the others to be there. She sings of her dream, an “English rose” to call her own. Mildred, the equally bossy English vocal coach of the operatic stars (stereotypes much?), forbids them from consorting with the locals in the bars. Of course, they rebel and, when they head to the bar after opening night, notice she is there too. Betty and Mildred gravitate to each other, are soul mates and form the first of two gay couples. Brian (Irish lyric tenor Seán Tester; Libenskof in ‘Il viaggio a Reims’ last year and Prince Nilsky in ‘The Gambler’ this year) is the opera buff at the office and the butt of Betty’s bullying. He is the first to hear the news of the Festival and Betty relents from badgering him to answer his phone in order to hear it. He sings of how “every tenor needs a baritone” but also how he can’t “tell his mother”. Yes, he is gay. He finds his baritone in the Argentinian star Facundo (probably RCS graduate, Scottish baritone Fraser Robinson, reviewed by me in 2 years of RCS MMus productions, now based in South Dublin), who earlier sang of meeting a nice Irish guy in Rome, “but he was going to be a priest”. Both are shy “wallflowers” at the after-show gathering. When the ice is broken, they find they don’t have a common language, but they hook up anyway.
Italian operatic star soprano Laura (probably Irish soprano Eva Maria Kavanagh) sings that Italian men are lovely when they sing the highest notes and “when they compose opera, they are Gods”, but they are terrible lovers. She longs to meet a “soft-faced Irishman”. Aidan from the office (probably Irish-born baritone Timothy Mays) fits the bill. Bernadette from the office (probably Irish soprano Deirdre Higgins - Eileen O’Doherty in ‘Lady Gregory in America’ 2 years ago) is starved of romance and longs for a Latin lover. Irascible vain Italian tenor Gianni (non-Factory Chinese lyric tenor Yu Shao, also appearing in Mascagni’s ‘Iris’ this year) has an even lower opinion of Ireland than Betty (“they eat dinner at lunchtime, and the food is terrible”) but he too is starved of romance and regards Wexford as his “last chance”. While he is busy schmoozing the receptive Bernadette at the after-show gathering, Brian keeps interrupting for Italian phrases to say to Facundo, who has no English, much to his irritation. He is not a bit impressed either at the grotty office space as the venue for a love tryst, but needs must. He is even more horrified to discover that they are not alone in the gloaming.
Caruso’s music has the same pace and whimsy as Tóibín’s writing; both are delightful. Hovering happily between sitcom and farce, the opera’s central character is opera itself, and its capacity to supercharge our emotions and lift us out of the mundane into the divine: opera is love. There are numerous comedic touches. The first couple to arrive at the darkened office after Betty and Mildred are Laura and Aidan. They slag off their respective “bosses”, unaware that they are present and eavesdropping, and not able to let it go. A caretaker wanders through the office, noticing nothing as they all stay stock-still. On his way back, he pauses to sweep up petal confetti that one couple has thrown, does a double-take at the realisation that there are four couples in the gloaming, drops the confetti again and trudges off without comment.
Vocal performances and characterisations were top-notch, as was the playing from the small pit ensemble. ‘The First Festival’ is a feel-good gem and a delight. A major thumbs-up from me. If I had more than two thumbs, they’d all be up.
Weblink: https://www.wexfordopera.com/programme/festival-programme/the-first-festival