Parthenogenesis (Royal Opera House Linbury Studio, 11 June 2009)

I attended the first night of this new production, directed by Katie Mitchell, of James MacMillan's small-scale opera Parthenogenesis. It's a problematic work - unsatisfactory musically or dramatically, mainly through its lack of narrative trajectory. It tells the 'true' story of a young woman caught in an explosion in Hanover in 1944. The shock, it is claimed, induced 'parthenogenesis' - a virgin birth. The story is told from the daughter's point of view - in hospital dying from cancer twenty-four years later, she imagines an angel visiting her mother (Kristel, played by Amy Freston) with a prophecy.

The angel, named Bruno (perhaps not the most angelic of names, but never mind) is played by Stephan Loges and dresses in a trilby and trenchcoat. He is a nervous figure - addressing Kristel like a furtive lover. Both singers tackled the difficult score with aplomb but their diction often suffered amidst bombastic orchestral accompaniment and hysterical vocal lines.

The most satisfactory element of the production was undoubtedly the set - exquisitely detailed and evocative. Both the drab bedroom and the clinical hospital ward that bisected the stage had a geniunely chilling air.

Britten Sinfonia were on great form under MacMillan's own baton. The score offered plenty of technical challenges and MacMillan's characterful combination of romantic lyricism and incisive dissonance, although there was an occasional vulgarity that jarred. As I emerged blinking into the foyer after an intense 50 minutes, I'm not sure I'd fully grasped the questions being asked by this perplexing piece. But I wanted to experience it again.

For more comment on Parthenogensis, see George Hall in The Guardian, Kieron Quirke in the Evening Standard and Anna Picard in The Independent on Sunday.