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23'In Cavalleria Rusticana Alexey Dolgov’s superb Tenor as Turiddu rubs shoulders with Samantha Crawford’s beautiful soprano as Santuzza.'
'As Elisabeth, Samantha Crawford was also inspired casting. She has the innocent presence and unconstricted soprano radiance perfect for this and other Wagner roles; the silvery gleam in her voice produced a trumpet- like 'Dich, teure Halle', and then she sang a beautifully remote prayer to the Jungfrau, Wagner's paraphrase of the Salve Regina. She engaged with the role, and it was thrilling.'
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12'Samantha Crawford made a young and personable Santuzza. Crawford has started singing the jugend-dramatisch Wagner roles, but her voice still felt lithe and light, suiting the youth of the character…Overall this was an engaging and sympathetic performance. Crawford made Santuzza youthfully impulsive and her narration to Sarah Pring's Mamma Lucia explaining the situation was wonderfully expressive.’
'Both casts deliver the vocal goods. In Cavalleria, Samantha Crawford voices the desperation of excommunicated Santuzza.'
Ruders and his librettist, Paul Bentley, have succeeded magnificently in transferring a book, much of whose action is in memories and internal monologue, to the stage. Flashbacks to Offred’s Life Before with her mother, husband, and daughter are back-projected black-and-white film. Act One ends with a birth — to the Handmaid Ofwarren, a moment of communal rejoicing — Act Two with a death, the whole framed by an academic symposium in which a historian in 2065 — Call My Agent!’s Camille Cottin — plays us Offred’s clandestine tapes, making it clear from the start that Gilead, like Nazi Germany, is a historical aberration.
Ruders’s detailed orchestral colours are never dull, swerving from the sweet tonality of Amazing Grace (quoted in the score) to aggressive dissonance, enhanced by a battery or instruments from harpsichord and piano to xylophone, bells, gongs, woodblocks, unidentifiable grindings and sizzlings and the insistent ambush of a large bass drum. Every aspect of the singing and production is impressive, fluently staged with a backdrop of drapes and a few mobile set pieces such as The Wall. The women of English National Opera’s chorus have many opportunities to shine, and do. The hardworking ENO orchestra excels.
“Bray’s music is challenging yet accessible, evocative, and filled with drama to complement the text. The scope of the vocal part wonderfully showcased Crawford’s range and technical prowess as well as her expert ability as a storyteller, which was central to the success of tonight’s lyrically-dense programme.”
‘The historic paucity of genuinely female-centred material [is] something that’s on the way to changing thanks to performers and composers such as these.’
'The Valkyries were superb.'
“The entire cast was cheered by the public, but Stuart Skelton in the role of Siegmund was the most acclaimed. Along with him, were René Pape (Hunding), Tomasz Konieczny (the god Wotan), Adrianne Pieczonka (Sieglinde), Ricarda Merbeth (Brünnilde), Daniela Sindram (Fricka), Julie Davies (Gerhilde), Samantha Crawford (Ortlinde) and Sandra Ferrández (Waltraute).”
