{"id":5722,"date":"2019-11-24T14:29:32","date_gmt":"2019-11-24T14:29:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larkreviews.co.uk\/?p=5722"},"modified":"2019-11-24T14:29:32","modified_gmt":"2019-11-24T14:29:32","slug":"creating-carmen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/?p=5722","title":{"rendered":"Creating Carmen"},"content":{"rendered":"

St George\u2019s Church, Kemp Town, Brighton<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

One of those shows which you can\u2019t pigeonhole neatly, Clare Norburn\u2019s thoughtful, intelligent Creating Carmen<\/em> is part play, part concert and part discursive essay. And it makes for a pretty riveting evening.<\/p>\n

Bizet\u2019s famous 1875 masterpiece was based on a novella by Prosper Merimee published thirty years earlier. Norburn presents the author (Robin Soans) in his study neurotically trying to retain control of his creation, a sexily exotic gypsy named Carmen (in the form of Suzanne Ahmet) \u00a0as she \u00a0taunts, haunts, cajoles and controls him. \u00a0He is variously rueful, irascible, annoyed and troubled because the book is not going as he wants it to. We are led to reflect on the process of a writer\u2019s art and to ask who is creating whom. The wittiest moment \u2013 in a piece which is full of cleverness and ingenuity – comes near the end when Merimee has decided she must die and stabs her. It doesn\u2019t work and when she moves we see that he has been trying to stab her in the back with his pen.<\/p>\n

The underlying dramatic irony is that the play assumes that everyone in the room knows about Bizet\u2019s opera but, of course, Merimee doesn\u2019t. His creation tells him it will happen but he refuses to believe her. \u201cSomeone beginning with B\u201d she tells him at one point. \u201cNot that dreadful friend of Delacroix, Berlioz?\u201d he replies. In the end she mentions Bizet but tells Merimee not to worry about it because at the moment the composer is still only a child of seven.<\/p>\n

And then of course there\u2019s the music which is, effectively, the leading character in the drama. The piece, which is touring, was commissioned by CarmenCo, a trio consisting of husband and wife Emily Andrews (flute and mezzo soprano) guitarist Francesco Correa with guitarist David Massey. The quality of the playing \u2013 which ranges from Carmen<\/em> itself to arrangements of\u00a0 de Falla, Roderigo, Ravel, Roderigo and more is exquisite. Massey\u2019s solo work is show-stopping and I loved the arrangement for two guitars and flute of de Falla\u2019s La Vida Breve.<\/em><\/p>\n

Emily Andrews sings several Carmen <\/em>numbers in role as the musical Carmen of the future. Clearly a multi-talented performer, as well as being a fine flautist she has a rich mezzo voice and a great deal of dramatic presence \u2013 along with a rare gift of blankness when she is simply sitting aside the action holding her flute. She\u2019s no slouch on castanets either.<\/p>\n

All the music is played off-book so there\u2019s an unusual sense of cohesion as these three players communicate continuously with each other with eyes and bodies. The result is a delightfully warm, intimate sound.<\/p>\n

Directed by Nicholas Renton and lit by Natalie Roland this interesting production sat neatly in front of the altar in the<\/p>\n

Georgian elegance of St George\u2019s Church, Kemp Town in Brighton. The chancel step provided a quasi-natural raised area and the use of candles felt absolutely right. That and\u00a0 the warm acoustic made the music as atmospheric \u2013 a Frenchman dreaming of Spain –\u00a0 as it could possibly be.<\/p>\n

Susan Elkin<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

St George\u2019s Church, Kemp Town, Brighton One of those shows which you can\u2019t pigeonhole neatly, Clare Norburn\u2019s thoughtful, intelligent Creating Carmen is part play, part concert and part discursive essay. And it makes for a pretty riveting evening. Bizet\u2019s famous … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5722"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5722"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5722\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5723,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5722\/revisions\/5723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}