A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Opera by B. Britten
Based on the ever-popular play by William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream is an opera by the English composer Benjamin Britten which has been captivating audiences for decades. This season, the opera continues to delight at the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, in Florence. The magic, illusion and questioning of reality inherent in the opera are all on show to transport audiences to a mysterious world of fairies, confused lovers and comic misunderstandings.
Britten wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream for the Aldeburgh Festival in Suffolk, England, which he served as the Artistic Director for at the time. The opera was composed to a libretto co-written by the composer and Peter Pears, Britten's long-time partner. They adapted it from the Shakespearean original, cutting it significantly down to three acts from the five the Bard had written. Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh, the festival's home, had been closed for refurbishments in 1959, so a new opera was planned for the hall's grand reopening the following year. Subsequently, A Midsummer Night's Dream went on to receive its premiere on 11 June 1960 at the newly renovated venue to mark the opening of that year's festival.
The plot of A Midsummer Night's Dream centres on a quarrel between the fairy king and queen, Oberon and Tytania. As a result, Oberon orders Puck, his mischievous servant, to use magic to cause someone to fall in love with the first creature they see on waking. Mistakenly, Puck uses his magical flower on the wrong person, setting off a night of magical interference in which lovers fall for the wrong people. In a famous comical scene, Bottom is transformed into a donkey and becomes the object of Queen Tytania's enchanted desire. How will the enchanted night end and will the romantic and social order be restored when it does?
Britten's music draws out many of the colourful characterisations that the Shakespeare play is known for, reinterpreting them through his meticulous scoring. For example, Tytania is often accompanied by a children's choir to represent her fairies. The forest and magic, both central features in the opera, are represented by eerie, sliding string chords which move slowly up and down. Puck is also distinguished by a spoken role. Highly rhythmic, his words are typically accompanied by a trumpet and snare drum in an extraordinarily distinctive operatic move by Britten.
With such an enchanting story and memorable musical flourishes throughout, Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream at Florence's Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino offers audiences a captivating journey into a world of folklore, summertime romance and comical confusion.