This is the year of the staircase. Up and down they go in Glyndebourne’s new Don Giovanni. Down and up they go in the Royal Opera House’s Il Trovatore. While first-nighters were enjoying Ariadne, other music-lovers were glued to the final of the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World. Congratulations to its overall winner, the sumptuous Italian bass Adolfo Corrado. If he wants a career in opera, I hope he’s got good knees. The skill of Saint’s characterisation is most prominently felt in that of Dionysus. He is given a vitality and youthful sense of liberation, which cannot hide his separation from humanity, even as great pathos is created. This pathos stems from the beautiful exploration of his relationship with his human mother Semele. Saint’s treatment of the characters and myths creates a compelling narrative with believable characters. And so, Ariadne provides the perfect antidote to the frequently misogynistic and frankly dull versions of the story which solely focus on Theseus. There are stellar vocal performances across the board. The intimate Garsington auditorium combined with the scaled down orchestra really allows the singers to shine. The prologue is dominated by the Composer (Polly Leech) who states he would rather burn his opera than have it besmirched by lowly harlequins (immediately before falling in love with one of them). Leech and Jennifer France’s Zerbinetta share a truly heartfelt moment that is rather touching before Zerbinetta dons her wig and costume and the Composer realises the extent of the compromise he’s made. Polly Leech and Jennifer France in Ariadne auf Naxos, Garsington Clive Barda 2023 This retelling clearly flew through the base myth, Theseus and Ariadne fleeing Crete at 30%, Dionysus being introduced at about 40%, and so on, I had no idea how it was truly going to end and the ending that was given did not leave me feeling satisfied in the least and mostly left me wondering what even was the point of the novel other than “women suffer a lot”

This is one of the many challenges. I’ve tried to serve the piece and the ultimate purpose of each scene. The prologue offers ample opportunities for comedy, as well as very moving moments. I try not to be too caricatural in the depiction of the characters, whilst playing with some of the in-jokes. Then when we get to the opera, I want to know why the buffi are going to Ariadne in the first quintet, how does Zerbinetta responds to her interaction with Ariadne, knowing what we know from her in the prologue? I often find when watching productions of Ariadne that the two worlds are miles apart in the opera and in conflict, but that leaves me unfulfilled. The very first appearance of the buffi in the opera shows them deeply moved by Ariadne. How do I carry this forward? I want to try and combine the two worlds with the ultimate purpose of showing how one can have an influence on the other. Three woman who join together to rent a large space along the beach in Los Angeles for their stores—a gift shop, a bakery, and a bookstore—become fast friends as they each experience the highs, and lows, of love.

Even with two clown consultants on board, Team Vaudeville’s four stooges don’t get quite the same chance to shine. A stage-upon-the-stage hems them in, and their props are rather restrained. When Ariadne falls in love with Dionysus: "He showed me that he was truly the best of all men, of all gods." This is a story many people will be familiar with, thus Saint seems to take pleasure in playing with the reader’s expectations. There are many little details that appear to be foreshadowing, yet when the time comes Saint neatly sidesteps the anticipated event. For this reason, this review will avoid going into too much plot-specific detail, although it will assume that the broad strokes are so commonly written about that they can no longer be spoiled.

An ancient story of love and sisterhood reimagined, Jennifer Saint's Ariadne is a truly masterful debut - compulsive, absorbing and lyrical. Saint breathes new life into the forgotten women of Greek mythology with a novel that's both incredibly absorbing, and full of heart.' - Kate Lowe, author of The Furies Amongst the many challenges of staging Ariadne is the arrival of Bacchus and the subsequent fate of Ariadne. How do you cope with these? The theatrical sparseness also means that music and emotion really hit home. Romaniw is an outstanding Ariadne, singing with great depth of feeling and an extraordinary richness of tone over the role’s wide range, her low notes as sumptuous as her upper register is thrilling. France, in her second UK Zerbinetta this year, is also excellent, her coloratura wonderfully accurate and gleaming. Kim sang handsomely with a telling, subtle use of dynamics. Leech’s Composer is bright-voiced, passionate and superbly acted. In the pit, the Philharmonia play quite wonderfully for Mark Wigglesworth, whose conducting is remarkable in its finesse, intensity and emotional depth. Silent cameos feature either the crew working on the movie – a director and his assistant, an electrician, a make-up artist and so on – or merely onlookers such as sponsors, all of them enlivening Gaitanou’s busy remake of the original.Ariadne, Princess of Crete, grows up listening to her nursemaid's stories of gods and heroes. But beneath her golden palace echoes the ever-present hoofbeats of her brother, the Minotaur, a monster who demands blood sacrifice. When Theseus, Prince of Athens, arrives to vanquish the beast, Ariadne sees in his green eyes not a threat but an escape. Defying the gods, betraying her family and country, and risking everything for love, Ariadne helps Theseus kill the Minotaur.

The story continues to follow the separate lives of the two sisters until they meet again years later when it is apparent that both women bear the scars of sorrow, love, betrayal and now deep seeded suspicion of each other as the events that shaped them now threatens to pull them apart. When you read Greek Mythology, you know tragedy is just lurking around the corner and this book is no different. This will be your third Strauss opera at Garsington Opera. Does this house have particular special qualities which make it ideal for these operas? I had thought he brought salvation with him. Instead he had traded my existing bondage for another.I just cannot pass up a Greek mythology retelling, and the story of Ariadne is an undeniably fascinating one. Growing up in Crete as the daughter of King Minos, she sees how her mother suffers at the hands of the gods as retribution for their anger towards the king. Ariadne vows to never be a pawn for the gods or for mortal men. When she is faced with the terrible atrocities happening under King Minos, will she have the courage to do the right thing and finally accept her destiny? The possibilities are endless, when a bunch of clowns join a bunch of opera singers (no jokes, please) but Ravella barely has the two groups overlap beyond their collisions in the score. In the mini-opera, loved-up Ariadne and Bacchus head for the stars, and the vaudevillians vanish. Less fuss … Polly Leech (The Composer) and Jennifer France (Zerbinetta) in Ariadne auf Naxos. Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The GuardianAriadne was the first book I’d read centred around Greek mythology and it instantly grabbed my attention. Ariadne makes one affirmative decision to help Theseus at the start of the story and then is just blown in the wind for the rest of the book. Even when she does stand up to others it amounts to nothing more than her own crippling self-doubt. Now it's true that Saint must follow quite closely the original source material but the internal life of Ariadne is all her own and that is unfortunately the weakest part of the story. It’s just really a shame because as much as I dislike “and they lived happily ever after” because I don’t mind a bit of pain, I REALLY don’t like to read about all women needlessly suffering at the hands of or because of men and that being the only message I take away from this novel when it was advertised as a “brilliant feminist debut” and WHEN THERE WAS AN AMAZING ALTERNATIVE WITHIN ESTABLISHED MYTHOLOGY.