Opera review: Katya Kabanova

Published on Friday 11 September 2009 20:51

SCOTTISH OPERA: KATYA KABANOVA **** EASTWOOD PARK THEATRE, GIFFNOCK

YOU don't often get to see the bright side of Janacek's harrowing opera Katya Kabanova, the preference (as in English Touring Opera's spring production this year in Perth) being to go big on black for a love story that ends with the heroine diving into the Volga and her hideous mother-in-law cooing over her successful mental campaign to drive Katya to it.

So how refreshing to see this small scale travelling production by Kally Lloyd-Jones for Scottish Opera offer a bit of light and shade in its slick presentation.

The sets are simple for the obvious reason – to fit the many compact, out-of-the way venues being covered in the company's ensuing tour. For the opening performance in Giffnock, it provided a homely backdrop to a tale whose outward simplicity is offset by Janacek's ravishingly intense musical score. That's where the real mental brutality lies. The majority of the cast fits into it like a glove, including endearing performances from Caryl Hughes as Varvara and Ben Thapa as Kudrjash, but they are the brighter couple. Nadine Livingston's Katya was powerful (almost overpowering at times), but her words (in English) weren't always clear. However, she portrayed her uneasy relationships with gutsy conviction.

In other key roles, Michael Bracegirdle played Boris with piercing bravado. Simon Crosby Buttle captured throughout Tikhon's tussle between domineering mother and frustrated wife. The rounded woolly quality of Emma Carrington's Kabanicha didn't quite match the character's acerbic nature.

But what a champion pianist Ian Ryan was, single-handedly transforming Janacek's heated orchestral colourings into a solo piano marathon, and losing none of its emotive power in the process. Quite unexpectedly, he actually intensified aspects of it – its rich rhapsodic outbursts and the inherent simplicity of Janacek's ideas.

An illuminating evening.