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Justina Gringyte with Alok Kumar (Don Jose) in Carmen | Photo: James Glossop

There was a ripple of unease among opera afficionados who hadn’t yet read their programmes when the curtain went up on this production to reveal a chorus of policemen singing in English. It was nothing to do with Christopher Cowell’s translation of Carmen but more the jarring effect of the flat English vowels on top of Bizet’s rapturous and seductive music.

Given that Carmen has large chunks of dialogue, choosing how best to balance the sung and spoken language can be a dilemma for companies like Scottish Opera keen to attract new and younger audiences. If the packed Festival Theatre on the final night of the company’s four Scottish city run was anything to go by, the English language version certainly played well with this demographic.

As did Sarah Beaton’s crime scene investigation set which used a projector to zoom in on the gory photographic evidence and relay it onto a large screen. Actor Carmen Pieraccini (Investigator), who has appeared in Scotland’s crime drama Taggart, was on stage for most of the opera. She strode up and down interrogating José as the tragedy unfolded in a series of flashbacks. This reflected the original perspective in Prosper Mérimée’s 1845 novella – which inspired Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy’s libretto – where José reveals the details of his crime while on death row.

A convincing Don Jose - Alok Kumar | Photo: James Glossop

Looking both haunted and hunted, Alok Kumar was a convincing José – hopelessly lovestruck but with anger and violence never far from the surface. Phillip Rhodes as Escamillo, a rival for Carmen’s affections, was also in fine voice giving a rousing account of the Toreador song.  Unfortunately Justina Gringytė’s Carmen lacked the passion and spark needed for opera’s most compelling freedom fighter. She has a big powerful voice, but struggled with the English pronunciation and phrasing and had no charisma. By contrast the vocal warmth of Hye-Youn Lee’s Michaëla was heartbreakingly believable while Scottish Opera Emerging Artists Lea Shaw (Mercédès) and Zoe Drummond (Frasquita) both sang superbly. 

There was also a lack of consistency in John Fulljames’s direction as he avoided exploring any emotional confrontation. During an intense argument when José is about to throttle Carmen, she puts a cigarette in her mouth, which just about pops out again. And when he does finally stab her it seems to happen at a distance. Carmen suddenly falls down, the fatal blow seemingly invisible. And while some of the crowd scenes tended to be a bit cluttered and clunky in direction, the scene outside the bullfight was well executed. At the forefront was the fabulous children’s chorus who not only sang well but scaled the high fence with alacrity. 

The best thing about this production was conductor Dan Lam’s fresh and pacey approach to this well-known score and the Orchestra of Scottish Opera delivered its vivid colours and insistent rhythms with aplomb. The hypnotic Spanish-inspired dotted notes that set the musical pulse were as sharp as a bullfighter’s banderillos while the strings soared and the woodwind contributed gorgeous flute, bassoon and oboe d’amore passages.