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Opera

Hans Werner Henze: the Ed Miliband of opera

Plus: a dud from Jonathan Dove at Opera Holland Park and a scorcher from Harrison Birtwistle at Aldeburgh

20 June 2015

9:00 AM

20 June 2015

9:00 AM

Ein Landarzt; Phaedra

Guildhall School of Music & Drama

Flight

Opera Holland Park

The Corridor; The Cure

Aldeburgh Festival

We opera critics love gazing into crystal balls. We’re particularly good at discovering Ed Milibands and backing them to the hilt. Postwar opera is full of them. Take Hans Werner Henze. He was considered the future his entire life. Yet watching a presentation of two of his chamber operas at the Guildhall School of Music last week, it was hard not to think, how? Why?

To be fair Henze never intended his early radio opera Ein Landarzt (1961) to work on stage.

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