Carmen

I rarely see societies who tackle Grand Opera such as this which when written by George Bizet was considered outrageous with its wanton woman theme. There are few societies who would attempt such a difficult and challenging piece but with the experience of voices, Musical Direction and Production in Saddleworth Musical Society they had a better chance than most.

And boy did they take that chance! What a wonderful piece of theatre. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The sets were fantastic, including a working water pump in the town square and with wonderful artwork courtesy of the very talented Pat Butterworth. The lighting plot worked well with the changes in mood of the different acts and scenes. The sound had no audible problems and the costumes were lovely too.

The chorus and Orchestra sounded wonderful under the expert baton of Harry Butterworth who had clearly worked hard for the players to learn the difficult score with great harmonies on chorus numbers.

The principal role of Carmen was filled beautifully by Mirriam Lawton who had wonderful vocals and acting to taunt her suitors. Her introduction song “Habanera” sung with chorus was lovely. Brent Andrews played a great Don Jose with lovely vocals and acting to convince us of his psychotic nature.

Deborah Thew was wonderful with fabulous vocals and acting as the innocent Michaela with a soft spot for Don Jose. Martin Bradbury filled the role of Escamillo the arrogant Toreador with fantastic vocals and the Toreador’s song was stunning.

The supporting principal roles filled by Alison Starrs as Mercedes and Deborah Williams as Frasquita again sounded wonderful and I particularly enjoyed the “Card Trio” and “Quintet” numbers.

The whole team especially the production team should be congratulated on the challenging choice of show and hard work in rehearsal to produce the wonderful execution of what for me was a fabulous piece of theatre from start to finish. Well done.

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