Britten - A Midsummer Night's Dream / Bowman, Cotrubas, Lott, Buchanan, Davies, Duesing, Haitink, Glyndebourne Opera

Rating:
Summary: A Dream come true
Review: I've been waiting for this to arrive on DVD having fallen in love with it on LaserDisk. And it has been worth the wait. Britten is up to the task of turning Shakespeare into opera. He devises a different sound for each of the three forces - the fairies, the mortals and the rustics. The casting is ideal with a young Cotrubas as Titania outstanding. Bernard Haitink keeps everything moving. And Peter Hall gives it a magical production with an eerie forest where the trees seem to have a life of their own. All comes to a head in the Pyramus and Thysbe drama played as a hilarious spoof of bel canto. Let yourself be translated to fairyland.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Music
Review: The London Philharmonic, the truly spectacular boy's voices, and some great opera singing show off the extraordinary brilliance of Britten's composition and make this recording a necessary part of a serious opera collection. But don't expect the same from the production. The sets and costumes leave much to be desired. None of the lovers look convincing, and the "moving branches" that constitute the forest make one think of Macbeth's Birnam Woods a bit too often! A "low budget" production can often work very well for live opera performances, but with zoom lenses on the cameras and a relatively large screen home theater, the flaws distract. I enjoyed some of the scenes more by turning away from the screen and just listening.