KATE GUELKE

La Donna Abbandonata - songs of sadness and madness

Spark Opera presented internationally renowned Irish American soprano Marielle Murphy in her Belfast debut as part of the buzzing Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival.

Murphy performed a varied programme of despairing arias and famous mad scenes from opera at the Ulster-Scots Discovery Centre.

 

Spark Opera was supported by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland. 

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"Director Kate Guelke wove a moody story of conflict and crabbiness around the seven ‘arias for abandoned women’ injecting drama back into the production... La Donna Abbandonata is a fine Belfast debut for Marielle Murphy showing off her mastery of Rachmaninov, Schubert, Mozart and Donizetti, and another great performance in the always varied Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival programme." - Alan Meban

 

"In theme and content, the whole thing is utterly of our time, replete with the subtext of the #MeToo campaign and carried off triumphantly by one of the world’s most compelling female operatic voices. Brava!" - Jane Coyle

 

“Opera Director Kate Guelke touches all the bases… Other companies could take more than a couple of notes from Spark Opera’s ingenious revolution of the recital form” – Tyler Stewart