Description:
All the ingredients for Rossini's prime comedy are present and expertly mixed in this 1987 Glyndebourne Festival Opera production: a Figaro (John Rawnsley) extroverted, ingenious, energetic, and vocally resplendent; a Rosina (Maria Ewing) fresh and sweet but steel-sinewed in her determination to have her own way; a Count Almaviva (Max-Rene Cosotti) who has not only the vocal lightness and agility his bel canto music requires, but a fine sense of humor and the ability to perform a good drunk scene. Ferruccio Furlanetto and Claudio Desderi are equally adept in their supporting buffo roles. This production is a joy to the eye as well as the ear. Everybody looks right for his or her part; the costumes are elegant and evocative of the story's time and place; the scenery, indoors and out, will evoke Seville for anyone who has seen that unique city. It is all brought together and given point and perspective by Sylvain Cambreling's idiomatic conducting and John Cox's deft staging. --Joe McLellan
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