Swanhunter, Linbury Studio Theatre, London - review

Instructions on how to make your own swan shadow puppet are included in the programme. Take two split pins, cocktail sticks, sticky tape and a torch or lamp, and follow the guide, as described. Those long years of watching Blue Peter have not been in vain.

Jonathan Dove's Swanhunter, an Opera North commission from 2009, is already on to its second production by the company. Clocking in at just over an hour, it is described as a children's opera for those aged seven and over, though there is little in the opera itself that is obviously aimed at the young.

What we get feels more like one of Dove's successful community operas in miniature. The story is taken from the Finnish legend of Lemminkainen and involves the trials he undertakes in his search for a wife. This new production by The Wrong Crowd for Opera North starts out with the singers in home-knitted woolly sweaters sitting in front of their tents and introducing the tale as if round the camp fire. Everyday items, such as sleeping bags and rucksacks, are used to create the magical creatures of the story. Other magic operas, such as Mozart's Die Zauberflote, have been treated in a similar homespun way.

In Hannah Mulder's production the do-it-yourself ingenuity is pleasing enough, but it offers the minimum to a child's imagination. "There isn't really any magic here" is surely the opposite message to the one that is desired. The singers, though, are adept at their multifunctional roles, especially Adrian Dwyer's sterling Lemminkainen and Ann Taylor as his mother, who gets a long solo of rising intensity at the end, providing some emotional engagement rather late in the day.

This is where Dove's music takes off, tapping into the sense of exultation so memorable from his other operas. The orchestra numbers only six, but Dove is a master of invention - evocative sounds can be elicited from horn, harp and accordion - and the players, conducted by Justin Doyle, showed that in the music of Swanhunter less can indeed mean more. After London, the production goes on tour round England until early May.

roh.org.uk

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