The Tales of Hoffmann — reviews and pictures

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Tales charged with passion and commitment

Pity the producer charged with mounting Offenbach’s The Tales of Hoffmann. Play the three stories in the opera as straightforward flashbacks, or treat the whole thing as a nightmarish fantasy?

Tim Hopkins has chosen the latter and, with designer Anthony Baker, created a stunner. This new Mid Wales Opera production is original in conception, packed with visual interest, and stunningly executed, especially by Keith Darlington’s tidy ten–piece orchestra. It’s also hauntingly dramatic, and like all vivid dreams makes us believe completely in what we are experiencing.

Economically staged on a single set with few props but lots of inventive twists (including Robert Wallbank’s moody lighting), the drama unfolds in turn from Hoffmann’s garret, where we find him slumped over a modern typewriter, to the various locations of the stories drawn from his alcohol-fuelled imagination.

Contemporary touches aside (the use of video images adds little to the symbolism of the piece) the performance sticks to tradition. Hoffmann’s four women are sung by one soprano, and the same bass–baritone portrays his four rivals, although in this touring show the parts are double cast, as is Hoffmann himself.

On Wednesday, Christopher Steele made a convincingly tortured, robustly sung Hoffmann, matched by an equally impressive Dean Robinson as the various villains of the piece. And Carolyn Dobbin, a mezzo of great warmth and clarity, in the roles of Nicklaus and Hoffmann’s Muse displayed none of the shortcomings a preliminary announcement had led us to expect.

First–night star, however, was soprano Catherine May, who delivered the famous Doll Song with a finely gauged, hard–edged brilliance and then, in Antonia’s Tale, sang a vibrant opening aria that conveyed all the character's frailty without sacrificing vocal quality.

David Hart

Review: The Tales of Hoffmann from Mid Wales Opera
Telegraph review online, 19th September

A brief but enthusiastic welcome for Tim Hopkins’s sharply imaginative, vivid and witty production of Offenbach’s The Tales of Hoffmann, currently being toured by Mid Wales Opera.

Resourcefully designed by Anthony Baker, neatly conducted by Keith Darlington and enthusiastically performed by an admirable young cast (among which Rebecca Ryan excelled in Olympia's coloratura), this is a hugely enjoyable staging, alive to all the ambiguities and resonances of a weird, flawed masterpiece.

Could Opera North or Welsh National Opera sign Hopkins up to develop his ideas on a larger scale?

Rupert Christiansen