Tormented by his father’s death, Hamlet’s vengeance is thwarted by his introspection in this new opera based on Shakespeare’s best-known tragedy.
‘To be or not to be,’ this is Hamlet’s dilemma, and the essence of Shakespeare’s most famous and arguably greatest work, given new life in operatic form in this new Glyndebourne commission.
Thoughts of murder and revenge drive Hamlet when he learns that it was his uncle Claudius who killed his father, the King of Denmark, then seized his crown and his wife. But Hamlet’s vengeance vies with the question: is suicide a morally valid deed in an unbearably painful world? ‘The themes of life and death, love and betrayal have opera written all over them,’ observes composer Brett Dean.
Dean’s colourful, energetic, witty and richly lyrical music expertly captures the modernity of Shakespeare’s timeless tale. While the story is pure Shakespeare, librettist Matthew Jocelyn adheres to the Bard’s narrative thread but abridges, reconfigures and interweaves it into motifs that highlight the opera’s main dramatic themes: death, madness, the impossibility of certainty, and the complexities of action.
Creative team
Composer: Brett Dean
Librettist: Matthew Jocelyn
Conductor: Duncan Ward
Director: Neil Armfield
Cast includes
Claudius: William Dazeley
Gertrude: Louise Winter
Hamlet: David Butt Philip
Polonius: Jeffrey Lloyd-Roberts
Laertes: Rupert Charlesworth
Ophelia: Jennifer France
Rosencrantz: James Hall
Guildenstern: Rupert Enticknap
The Glyndebourne Tour Orchestra
The Glyndebourne Chorus
Music by kind permission of Boosey & Hawkes Publishers Ltd.
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