Rossini was only 19 in 1811, when he wrote his first opera buffa, L'Equivoco Stravagante (The Strange Misunderstanding). It had an unfortunate history: after three performances, the authorities in Bologna banned it. Now, Garsington Opera is presenting it in a sparkling production by Massimo Gasparon with his own very pretty designs.
Musically, the wonder is how mature the teenage Rossini was, with his style fully developed. It would be too much to expect that the arias have memorable melodies like those in his finest operas, but the ensembles are superb, as light and ingenious as those in his later works. This is fully exploited at Garsington, with David Parry drawing exhilarating performances from his excellent team of soloists and the Garsington Opera Orchestra.
Dramatically, the weakness of the piece is that the main nub of the plot only emerges in act two, when the "strange misunderstanding" of the title is revealed. The scheming servant, Frontino, seeking to scare off Buralichio, the rich but dim suitor of the heroine, Ernestina, feeds him the idea that she is not a girl at all but a castrato in disguise and a deserter from the army. Evidently, that idea was the one that stuck in the censors' throats.
Gasparon's production is highly camp, with mannered acting to match. So Frontino is represented as an effete dandy, brilliantly sung and acted by the tenor, Darren Abrahams. The other tenor, Colin Lee, playing the impecunious hero, Ermanno, is excellent too, in a clean-cut, more forthright way.
For Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte this year, Garsington has brought in the director John Cox, who has had the idea of setting the piece in around 1915, when Italy entered the first world war. Set in a very grand hotel, with Don Alfonso as the manager, the update works remarkably well: Ferrando and Guglielmo go off to the war as soldiers, then promptly return as bearded Albanian sailors. The problem of who partners whom at the very end is neatly solved when the pair wave goodbye to the girls without committing themselves, this time genuinely on their way to the war.
Steuart Bedford conducts the orchestra and an excellent cast in a taut and resilient account of this magic score. Jonathan Best, dominant as Don Alfonso, and Lilian Watson as an exceptionally characterful Despin hold the reins firmly, while Sarah-Jane Davies rises splendidly to the challenge of Per Pieta in act two.
· L'Equivoco Stravagante is in rep until July 11, and Cosi Fan Tutte until July 10. Box office: 01865 361636.
