Saffron Opera Group’s 2025 opera in concert was another foray into Wagner, their first Der Fliegende Holländer, and it was a good one. The acoustic in the wood-lined Saffron Hall is so warm and full that the orchestral sound wrapped itself around the audience and drew us into the action. Under Michael Thorne’s baton, the music surged, gripped and impelled us onward. The players made the storms and sea spray sound so real that I almost expected to be drenched in it. Although Thorne kept a very careful control over his forces, in this orchestra-friendly acoustic it was inevitable that there would be occasional imbalances between the players and singers, and there was also one rather Schönbergian trumpet note. The 51-strong chorus sang their hearts out as sailors, spinners and spectres, and they made a most terrific sound, especially in Act I.
Although there was not enough space in front of the orchestra for anything approaching a production, the singers wore attire befitting the characters they played, and their acting, interactions and responses to one another created a compelling dramatic atmosphere. All six were excellent, but Mari Wyn Williams, fresh from her triumph as Senta at Opera North earlier this year, was in a class of her own. From the first notes she sang, it was clear that this was going to be something exceptional. The intensity of her dramatic portrayal was matched by her timbre, as beautiful as soft silver but as direct as a blade. The Ballad was utterly thrilling, and she maintained the same concentrated intensity through the scene with Erik and the love duet, where her startled yelp on seeing the Dutchman for the first time was the most effective that I can recall. But it was in Act III that she hit her greatest heights, achieving an elemental power which was all the more astonishing because she had never sung the role until this year. If she could achieve something like this in her first year in the role, what will she do with it in a few years’ time? The thought is intoxicating. Elsa, Elisabeth and above all Sieglinde should now be on her horizon.
Simon Thorpe is a wonderfully honest singer. The rich beauty of his voice, caressed by the Hall’s acoustics, shifted subtly from the unending despair of Die Frist ist um to the first sign of warmth in his duet with Daland, his first interaction with a human being in seven long years, and to the increasing sense of wonder and tenderness on meeting Senta. In Act III, his devastation on thinking her false was painful, and he brought a lump to my throat when he extended his hand to Senta and they departed, hand in hand, into the hereafter. This was a performance to treasure.
Andrew Greenan, a Saffron Opera Group stalwart, was a richly characterful Daland, gloriously sung, vivid and less venal than usual. Charne Rochford gave Erik Heldentenor vocal strength while bringing out this needy man-child’s whiny, me-me-me selfishness. Yvonne Howard was luxuriously cast as Mary, and Andrew Henley, a new name to me, was a stalwart Steeurmann, not the usual lyric tenor but another Heldentenor in the making.
Saffron Opera Group have done it again. Next year, they will give us something completely different: Dialogues des Carmelites, one of the most intense and harrowing operas ever written. I can’t wait.