Don Giovanni is back to entrance audience

There is a second chance to see the stunning opera Don Giovanni which had its first highly acclaimed peformance at Rye Arts Festival on September 12.
Don GiovanniDon Giovanni
Don Giovanni

The opera will be staged again next Saturday in the Milligan Theatre at Rye College.

It is performed by Euphonia under its director/conductor Alisdair Kitchen who gets together a company of young professional singers and musicians to do a full staged opera exclusively for Rye Arts Festival for four of the last five years.

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Organiser Andy Stuart commented: “The cast is fantastic and international. Soprano Rannveig Karradotir is from Iceland and she is back this year after starring in the title role La Traviatta at last year’s Rye Arts Festival. She is singing in Italy during the break between these year;s performances.

Don GiovanniDon Giovanni
Don Giovanni

Another Soprano (in the 10-strong cast) is Turiya Haudenhuyse, who is from Belgium.”

The Third soprano Gemma Summerfield, who also sang last year is from Crewe. She recently won the highly prestigious Kathleen Ferrier prize.

He added: “The phrase ‘world class’ is bandied about easily these days, but these young singers who are at the start of their professional careers really are!”

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A review by Nick Farley of Northiam stated: “I know that many people wonder how it is possible properly to stage an opera in a modest theatre in a school in Rye, and perhaps I can understand their feelings, but if any of those nay-sayers and sceptics had been standing and cheering with us in The Milligan Theatre last Saturday night after The Euphonia Company’s brilliant production of Don Giovanni they would have had all their doubts swept aside. It was such a joy, and easily a match for anything seen on much grander stages. The superb professional young cast and orchestra assembled by Alisdair Kitchen, the director and conductor, and the driving force behind The Euphonia, would grace any auditorium.

Don Giovanni was originally set in 18th century Spain, but Alisdair Kitchen has surprisingly set his Don Giovanni on a 20th century railway train and, to my amazement, it works really well; you’d have thought that that was how Mozart intended it. But why am I cruelly telling you all about a brilliant performance which you have apparently missed? Well, because for the first time at The Rye Arts Festival there are to be two performances of the opera...If you did miss it first time round, don’t make the same mistake twice.”

For tickets or more details call 01797 224442 or go to www.ryeartsfestival.co.uk

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