When the world of the fairies meets the real world, chaos is inevitable. Four young friends flee their destiny and get lost in a thick forest. The forest is the realm of fairy king Oberon, who is deep intwined in a fight with his fairy queen Titania. He enlists the help of Puck, to play a trick on his wife as well as on the four young friends. Puck makes both boys fall in love with the same girl and Titania with a strange creature. In the end, Puck reverses the magic, and the two couples reconcile and marry. Also, Oberon and Titania find their love for each other again. Happy end for everyone! So far goes the Shakespearean story of A Midsummernight’s Dream.
The Fairy Queen is, so to say, a musical addition to Shakespeare’s play and was composed 100 years after the play’s premiere. It is a special form of English baroque opera (also known as a masque or semiopera) and contains both sung and spoken parts, and also larger ballet interludes. The story with Titania and Oberon happens in Shakespeare’s play, whereas Purchell’s Fairy Queen focuses on creating the crazy fairy world as an entirety. The English loved this type of entertainment above all else. There was plenty of chatting, breaks and even picnics; all of this during the performances.
As colorful and expressive as Henry Purcells opulent music, are the costumes and the stage design from our visiting opera company Festival Perelada. Fun, despair, excitement, disappointment, love and fear lie right next to each other in this entertaining baroque opera, based on Shakespeare’s play “A Midsummernight’s Dream”. This evening has about everything in store and is – well, a Summernight’s dream at Savonlinna Opera Festival.
