Profile reviews
10It must be said though that, excellent as all these singers were, Peter McGillivray stole the show as the self-regarding, incompetent First Lord of the Admiralty, the Rt. Hon. Sir Joseph Porter. With impeccable timing, surprisingly delicate movement, and an accent to die for, McGillivray's over-the-top performance swept the decks.
Baritone Peter McGillivray was encouraged to play his part as Sir Joseph Porter with over-the-top abandon; his way with the authentic G&S material was impeccable.
Past Production Reviews
9Baritone Peter McGillivray is also to be celebrated in his role as the buffoonish Doctor Bartolo. McGillivray’s resonant singing filled the auditorium with a vibrant sonority that helped translate the comedic vision for his character to the audience. McGillivray’s Bartolo was an audience favourite for good reason: he embodies the essence of his character, and backs it up with rich, round singing.
High praise is owed to baritone Peter McGilivray for his virtuoso performance as Bartolo. McGillivray channelled Daffy Duck’s spluttering rages, but for all of his physical comedy and over-the-top bluster the role never got away from him vocally.
Although the role Dr. Bartolo — a Malvolio-style fool — is much smaller, bass-baritone Peter McGillivray gave larger-than-life performance. Clownishly bespectacled, McGillivray...displayed a canny knack for physicality, at one point angrily giving Figaro’s hairbrush a savage scissoring before stabbing it.
Baritone Peter McGillivray’s Don Magnifico would be a tough act for anyone to follow, with the hugely charismatic singer crafting a larger-than-life persona including no-holds barred physical comedy skills, as well as booming through his opening Act 1 aria, Miei rampolli femminini
"Peter McGillivray was at his scene-stealing best as Bottom"
Vancouver Opera closed the season with HMS Pinafore, or the Lass that Loved a Sailor. One of Gilbert and Sullivan’s most popular operas, Pinafore mocks Victorian memes - forbidden love and secret pining, class distinction and proper behaviour – and piles on Gilbertian ridicule of political incompetence and Sullivan’s musical parodies.
A feel-good operetta has fun while trying to show the world has changed since women wore pinafores
“Indeed, Rachel Peake has done her job so well that it can be difficult, while you are laughing so hard, to remember that these are killer vocal parts being sung exquisitely. Mezzo Simone McIntosh wins over the audience with sheer vocal agility and a lovely rich sound.”
“The opera is centred on the role of Cenerentola (Cinderella) and Simone McIntosh radiated the pure inner beauty of her character without a trace of self-righteousness or superiority. Even if rapidly rattling off the text’s relentlessly repeated fricative sibilants—a device Rossini uses almost to excess—was not her forte, that particular type of vocal virtuosity is not germane to her character. Her opulent, floating mezzo-soprano was perfectly suited to the role’s more quietly loving and sincere passages in the midst of the fractious, comedic ado transpiring all about her.”
