Yannis 

Thavoris

Stage 

Design

L'Heure Espagnole

L'Heure Espagnole

L'Heure Espagnole

L'Heure Espagnole

L'Heure Espagnole

L'Heure Espagnole

Gianni Schicchi

Gianni Schicchi

Gianni Schicchi

Gianni Schicchi

Gianni Schicchi

Gianni Schicchi

Ravel L'Heure Espagnole / Puccini Gianni Schicchi Guildhall School, November 2013 Director Stephen Barlow Lighting Jake Wiltshire

Reviews 

A deft and witty double bill... Barlow’s production of both pieces puts a musical conceit at their centers – apt for a conservatory performance, with lots of scope for musical in-jokes that suited this audience down to the ground. “L’heure Espagnole” takes place not in a clockmaker’s but a music shop, timepieces replaced by double bass cases, hefted to the bedroom and back by Ramiro, the buff, guileless delivery guy. Tempo markings adorn the set – Ramiro’s stopped clock – a violin – is marked ‘Sans mouvt.’; it is restored by Torquemada to ‘A tempo’ by the end. Concepción is corseted by a pair of string instrument F-holes (a naughty joke, perhaps). The piece opens with a smart coup de théâtre on this theme: the curtain rises to a slew of metronomes, ticking away, and winding down... The musical setting is witty enough. Musical time makes an especially piquant contrast to the regulated clock time of work...

A Gianni Schicchi without a bed for poor dead Buoso? Perish the thought. But Barlow’s recasts him as a composer, slumped over the piano, which gives an artistic gloss to the questions of legacies unpacked in the opera. It’s a great choice for a conservatory company... Characterful sets and costumes... (Opera Wire)


Monuments to past greatness, or at least renown, included a Maggio Musicale poster for one of Donati’s operas. A large instrument case inherited from the set for L’Heure espagnole, provided a place to hide the body where necessary. But the crucial action lay, as it were, in the interaction, clearly well planned and rehearsed both by Barlow and conductor Alice Farnham. Yannis Thavoris’s costumes contributed to the framework for delineation of character... Ravel’s L’Heure espagnole had taken place in a musical instrument repair shop El Tempo, time more overtly met music in the guise of instrument cases with time signatures and tempo markings: ‘4/4’, ‘Assez vite’, and so on. The largest functioned as clock cases to be hiked up- and downstairs by Ramiro. Again set, costumes, and lighting (Jake Wilshire) made a considerable contribution to the overall mise-en-scène. (Opera Today)

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