Brilliantly Dispatched

Ian McEwan and Michael Berkeley's 'For You',
reviewed by GIUSEPPE PENNISI

About one year ago (on 20 December 2009), I reported that 'chamber opera' is alive and well on the basis of Italian and American chamber operas touring Italy at that time. Chamber opera requires a small orchestra, a few soloists, no chorus and normally quite simple sets; thus, it is easy to transport performances from theatre to theatre and from town to town. Other chamber operas, especially brand new chamber operas, have delighted the audiences at summer festivals -- in particular, Oscar Strasnoy's engrossing Un Retour which had its début in Aix-en-Provence in July.

Two British chamber operas are currently touring Italy: Powder Her Face (1995) by Thomas Adès (born 1971) and For You (2008) by Ian McEwan and Michael Berkeley (both born in 1948). These works are generally quite well known to British and Anglo-Saxon audiences, especially Powder Her Face, which after a controversial start, also became a movie...