ALBERT HERRING
The average operagoer often considers Benjamin Britten a one-opera composer. Peter Grimes is his operatic masterpiece, but there are a good dozen Britten operas that are neglected.
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It was a decade ago that Chicago Opera Theater gave Chicago its first hearing of Albert Herring, revealing it for the comic gem that it can be when placed in capable artistic hands. Two seasons ago, COT gave us another Britten premiere, his haunting adaptation of The Turn of the Screw. As part of COT’s 15th-anniversary season, Albert Herring returns to Chicago, much to the delight of COT audiences.
Feeling sorry for Albert, coworker Sid and his girlfriend arrange to spike Albert’s lemonade at the May Day picnic in his honor, just to “loosen him up a bit.” In the end, Albert is found wanting after all: he uses his coronation prize money to go for a wild, drunken night on the town and declares his “coming of age” to the horrified townsfolk, who had given him up for dead when he disappeared. (Although the original story was set in Normandy, Britten moved the action to his own home ground, East Suffolk in England, and strove to capture much of its local color.)
