A night at the opera

To distract ourselves from evenings glued in front of the TV – practically every channel yesterday was showing either long lines of the elderly lining up (some since 4 a.m.) to collect their meager pensions, or politicians and journalists endlessly arguing – we opted for a night at the opera.

Salome, at the Karolos Koun Art Theatre, is a weird but skillfully choreographed and beautifully lit production, based on the oratorio San Giovanni Battista by Alessandro Stradella. The music was played by the baroque ensemble Latinitas Nostra.

The theater is not very big, but there was not a single empty seat. Others had had the same idea as us: life must go on, after all. We arrived to find groups of people clustered on the pavement, enjoying being out and about on a lovely summer evening. The talk around us was, of course, exclusively about the situation in Greece, but, once the opera started, we were transported into a different world.

The setting was a hammam in the orgiastic court of King Herod, and the large cast included a hideous and confused Herod in a fat suit, a stunning topless black dancer, a middle-aged angel in black wooden wings, and even an unsettling female dwarf. All the singers were excellent, but the luminous presence of soprano Myrsini Margariti gave the perfomance an added lift. The energy and grace she puts in her acting, as well as the soaring purity of her voice and the sheer joy she brings to her singing, made her the center point of almost every scene. Her versatility as an artist helped her inhabit a role which, as she confesses, is not exactly suited to her character.

The opera starts with some disquieting scenes, but the beauty of the music and the pace of the action carry the audience to the forceful finale. The cast was rewarded with sustained and enthusiastic applause.