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Contemporary Review, Nov, 1998 by Laurence Green

Actors with painted faces recite Shakespearean soliloquies in the streets, acrobats perform somersaults in front of astonished passersby, fire eaters stage dangerous stunts and the sound of bagpipes fills the air and merges with the noise of traffic and pedestrians. This can only mean one thing - the world's largest arts festival, the Edinburgh International Festival, was again in full swing. Nowhere else is a festival so all-pervading that it seems to take over the whole life of the city. The 1998 event presented over 170 performances of music, theatre, opera and dance ranging from the UK premiere of Ballanchine's magical ballet A Midsummer Night's Dream to concerts of Scottish harp music. The Royal Opera Covent Garden returned with a two-week residency led by music director Bernard Hairink and some of the world's greatest singers, showcasing the operas of Giuseppe Verdi with librettos based on plays by Friedrich Schiller. This provided a unique opportunity to explore in depth the relationship between composer and dramatist.

The most eagerly awaited event was the ravishing new production of A Midsummer Night's Dream (Playhouse Theatre) performed by the Pacific Northwest Ballet, one of America's most lauded classical ballet companies. based on Shakespeare's comedy, this work, set to glorious music by Mendelssohn, marked George Balanchine's first full length ballet. The attractive sets and costumes - the corps de ballet, for example, wear dresses in pale shades of red, orange and yellow to symbolise the winged fairies and butterflies - were designed by Martin Pakledinaz. An arch of pink cabbage roses frames the set - a moonlit forest of silhouetted trees, while a large snail shell lined with coral-pink cushions serves as the lair of Titania. Balanchine reduces the storyline to a minimum, concentrating instead on the dance as an embodiment of the music, and also manages to condense the plot entirely to the first act so that the second act is nothing but a set of delightful divertissements, unencumbered by narrative, celebrating the triple marriages of the leading characters. Mendelssohn's score - excellently performed by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra - is perfectly evocative of character and mood and creates a feeling of enchantment and wonder that was beautifully conveyed in the dancing - light, sprightly and athletic. Anne Derieux brought an ethereal grace to the role of Titania, while Paul Gibson made an authoritative Oberon, and there was a marvellously fetal, exquisitely nimble Puck from Seth Belliston. Patricia Barker and Jeffrey Stanton seemed ideally matched in the act two divertissement in what must be one of the loveliest pas de deux Balanchine ever created. PNB brings the production to new Sadler's Wells next February.

Skeletons hang ominously round the stage, on the walls are written 'Juden raus! Vaterhaus!' and men and women run about screaming, chairs lie upturned and paper is strewn everywhere. No this is not a scene from Nazi Germany in the 1930s but a radical new version of Schiller's The Robbers (King's Theatre), performed by the Glasgow Citizens Theatre, directed by Philip Prowse, and set in a country in the grip of tyranny. This play, with its Shakespearean echoes, is a dark and turbulent exploration of brothers in conflict, fighting for supremacy in their father's affection and the regard of the world. Both are in love with the same woman. Sex and jealousy, liberty and fraternity, fidelity and ambition are all explored in this dramatic and violent play. Despite some intriguing ideas and reasonable performances, this production seemed unfocused and went off at all tangents and in all directions. A good opportunity wasted.

On the evening of the same day I went to see the operatic version of the play - Verdi's I Masnadieri (Edinburgh Festival Theatre), staged by the Royal Opera who seemed to have taken up temporary residence at the festival while Covent Garden undergoes redevelopment. This version of two brothers at war, one a Machiavellian schemer, the other an impetuous warrior, concentrates on the emotional effects of the political and violent plot. Director Elijah Moshinsky keeps the drama tight and absorbing, while the set of sliding glass partitions serves as an effective backdrop to the action. Italian tenor Franco Farina was in strong voice as Carlo, the errant son who has run off to join the brigands, and managed to phrase and colour his melodies very musically. Soprano Paula Delligatti was agile and affecting as Amalia, the orphan girl desired by both brothers - a role originally created for the Swedish Nightingale Jenny Lind, and gritty-voiced Carlo Colombara was most touching as the old father. But best of all was Dmitri Hvorostovsky, with a truly authentic sneer and in magnificent voice, as the villain. A further word of praise must also go to Sir Edward Downes and the Royal Opera Chorus for bringing Verdi's excellent score so vividly to life.

The Royal Opera's other major production in Edinburgh was Verdi's epic tragedy Don Carlos (also at the Edinburgh Festival Theatre), again inspired by a Schiller drama and here performed in the original five act French version commissioned by the Paris Opera. Verdi worked on his version for almost 20 years, making it a constant work-in-progress. Under Bernard Haitink's assured conducting and with Luc Bondy's fine directing, this version of the complex relationships between King Philip of Spain, his troubled son Don Carlos and his new young wife Elisabeth was explored with a renewed sense of vigour, in a delicate and emotionally revealing way. Julian Gavin sang the title role with strength and maturity, and was more than ably supported by Violeta Urmana as Princess Eboli, Ferrucio Furlanetto as Philippe II, Thomas Humpson as Rodrigue, and especially Karita Mattila who sang with great beauty and sensitivity as Elisabeth de Valois.