According to the statistics, there are more operas based on Shakespeare than on the work of any other single writer – a clear case of composers following the money. And the catalogue has just been increased by one more: an adaptation of The Winter’s Tale, which seemed from its world premiere at ENO to have absorbed so many of the lessons of past Shakespeare settings that it ran with the impressive smoothness of precision engineering.
The composer was Ryan Wigglesworth, a rising star of contemporary music who has a diverse career as both an academic and conductor, thus keeping his creative output small. But almost every piece he’s written has applied intelligence and craft to ideas that have theatrical potential. And although this new opera is his first, it arrives fully formed, re-telling Shakespeare’s pantomime-like Tale of lives destroyed by jealousy with a clarity and sense of purpose that discards whatever isn’t central to the story.
