Rigoletto

Synopsis

Rigoletto, the hunchbacked court jester wants revenge. His beloved daughter, Gilda, has been abducted and seduced by the Duke and he hires a hit-man to assassinate him. Tragedy prevails in Verdi's masterpiece of love, lust and betrayal. Based on Hugo's Le roi s'amuse. First performed at La Fenice in Venice on 11 March 1851

Our Review:

30 March 2012

In his introductory programme note to this latest revival, Covent Garden’s new director of opera, Kasper Holten, writes of Verdi’s Rigoletto that to understand it fully “…you need to address the vulgarity, frivolity and short-term gratification”. While David McVicar’s drab-as-dust 2001 staging brims with these qualities, Sir John Eliot Gardiner proffers a contrary view of Verdi’s score and in doing so knocks the stuffing out of it. Vulgar? Frivolous? The very idea… No, the venerable conductor’s fast, fastidious account of the composer’s favourite child is anglo-patrician: high on discipline and low on red blood cells.

Perhaps that explains some gratuitous showboating by Vittorio Grigolo, hunk du jour among tenors, who seemed increasingly at odds with the baton charge as the evening progressed. By the time he reached his act three showstopper, ‘La donna è mobile’, tenor and conductor were b...

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