Halévy: La Juive
Opera Vlaanderen, Antwerp, 10th March 2019
Watching an Orthodox Jew walking down the Keyserlei, a street packed with jewellers, it struck me that Antwerp, with its prolific diamond trade, would be a good setting for Fromental Halévy’s opera La Juive. The Jew Éléazar is “un orfevre joaillier” – a goldsmith-jeweller – by trade, whose noisy hammering of metalwork during a religious festival outrages the Christians. How did I know the gentleman I passed was Jewish? The broad-rimmed hat, the payot (sidelocks), the long black coat. But director Peter Konwitschny, reviving his production of La Juive for Opera Vlaanderen in Antwerp, dispenses with most religious symbolism.
Corinne Winters (Rachel) and Ray Cornelius Smith (Éléazar)
© Opera Ballet Vlaanderen
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