This first revival again stars American counter-tenor Anthony Roth Costanzo in the title role, giving a career-defining performance of awe-inspiring grace and otherworldliness.Ĭonductor Karen Kamensek, who specialises in Glass's music, spins the seemingly endless thread that is this entrancing score.

Photo Jane Hobsonĭirector Phelim McDermott and Improbable first staged this new production of Glass's 1983 opera in 2016. Like echoes from the past, its phrases evolve imperceptibly, as hard to define as the shifting contours of sand dunes.Īnthony Roth Costanzo in costumes by Kevin Pollard. And through the twin prisms of Victorian amateur archaeology and modern tourism, we re-enter Ancient Egypt to the sound of Glass's deceptively restless music. We visit this rarified world by cracking open the mummified remains of his father, from which the new, spotless pharoah emerges.

In his case, the project is abandoning the many gods of his ancestors, in place of the one, sun god. He is a leader like no other and also like countless others, oblivious to his people, obsessed with a project irrelevant to their needs. If the details of the 17-year reign of this pharaoh slip your mind, here an opportunity to revisit Thebes in the 14th century BC and the singular world of Akhnaten. Receive free tickets & insider tips to unlock the best of London - direct to your inbox Try it

Akhnaten la opera review