Boosey & Hawkes

Floyd's Susannah scores success at Wexford Festival

(December 2005)

Audiences and press concurred that Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah was the hit of the 2005 Wexford Festival, where the production proved the opera to be just as vivid and moving in a small theatre as at The Met. Though regularly performed throughout North America, and having enjoyed major recent stagings in Vienna, Berlin, Geneva and Nantes, the opera awaits new productions in many European cities, and "hopefully Wexford’s staging will have enough impact to establish the piece more firmly". (Opera Now)

"Susannah quickly caught the public imagination, notching up some 800 performances to become one of the most popular American operas ever. Watching Wexford's taut new staging by John Fulljames, it's easy to see why…Its 10 sequential scenes are crisply enacted…Floyd's music is tuneful, resourceful and admirably orchestrated…Wexford's audience adored the directness of drama and music alike."
The Independent

"Composed 50 years ago at the height the McCarthy persecutions, it is a flawlessly effective melodrama focused on an innocent woman victimised by a narrow Evangelical community in rural Tennessee. …it speaks straight to the heart through music of uninhibited tonal simplicity and Pucciniesque fervour."
Daily Telegraph

"The story of Susannah and the Elders has as much relevance now as ever, hypocrisy and the destruction of innocence never going out of fashion… an impassioned reading… a strong argument for this neglected piece which could offer so much pleasure if seen more widely."
Opera Now

"Susannah packed powerful theatrical and musical punches…"
Opera

Floyd celebrates his 80^th birthday on 11 June and a strong upbeat has been provided by the release of the first recording of his comic opera Cold Sassy Tree (Albany Troy 758-59). The opera was co-commissioned by Houston Grand Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, Baltimore Opera, Opera Carolina and San Diego Opera, receiving its premiere in 2000. The new recording features the original Houston cast including Patricia Racette, Dean Peterson and John McVeigh.

> Further information on Work: Susannah

Floyd photo: Jim Caldwell

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