Weber
Oberon – Opera in three Acts to a libretto by James Robinson Planché with a new verse narration by Timothy Knapman [sung and spoken in English with English surtitles]
Oberon – Nicky Spence
Reiza – Jennifer Davis
Sir Huon of Bordeaux – John Findon
Sherasmin – Yannick Debus
Fatima – Rachael Wilson
Puck – J’Nai Bridges
Mermaids – Charlotte Bowden & Jessica Cale
Narrator – Tamsin Greig
Monteverdi Choir
Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique
Sir Mark Elder
Emma Doherty – Stage director
Reviewed by: Rob Pennock
Reviewed: 6 August, 2026
Venue: Royal Albert Hall, London
Weber’s Oberon has almost sunk without a trace and as Mark Elder explained in the Guardian, it’s ‘sprawling tale of fairyland, desert islands, pirates, crusaders and an imaginary Arabia would have been completely acceptable in the 1820s but now seems very far away’. He also felt that the extended written dialogue between the characters needed to be revised, so Timothy Knapman reduced the parts to a single narrator, as happened in John Eliot Gardiner’s semi-staged production at the Theatre du Chatelet, Paris in 2002 (Philips). His rhythming, contemporary parlance version tells the story by referencing things like a franchise spin-off of Shakespeare, Mission Impossible and the Marvel extended universe. It is certainly very clever and was brilliantly delivered by Tamsin Greig, but you do wonder if a bit more pruning would have been efficacious.
As ever with Weber the music is wonderfully inventive, packed with brilliant melody and exquisitely scored. No wonder Wagner revered him. Some misguided critics have mentioned it occasionally sounds like Gilbert & Sullivan, seemingly having forgotten that it should be the other way round, given that Oberon was written in 1826, the first G&S in 1871.
The performance got off to a shaky start with several fluffs in the opening natural horn solo, but Elder injected plenty of drama into the Overtures use of themes from the opera. The period instruments brought clarity, even if the timpanist was rather demure and the woodwind occasionally sounded sour. He and the Monteverdi Choir then danced their way wistfully through the description of Oberon’s fairy kingdom and throughout, as you might expect from a professional chorus, they sang and characterised beautifully. Elder, who spent 14 years at the ENO, rarely put a foot wrong in terms of pacing and when needed elicited plenty of power from the orchestra, although occasionally you did miss the power and projection of a modern instrument.
Of the singers, Nicky Spence was his usual eloquent self in the title role. John Findon is a heroic tenor, but in his Act 1 recitative and aria the sense of strain at the top, particularly at anything less than forte and the ungainly fioritura were far from ideal. Domingo for Kubelik (DG) and Kaufmann for Gardiner show how it can be done. As his lover Reiza Jenifer Davis was far more impressive, delivering Ocean, thou mighty monster, with aplomb. The rest of the cast were good, but not outstanding.
Should it have been rescued from obscurity? Absolutely, Weber was a great composer and the modern world dredges up far lesser works from the dustbin of musical history.
Read Curtis Roger’s review of this concert here