REVIEW: The Clown of Clowns, as part of the Arcola's Opera Festival 'Grimeborn'

Part of the Grimebourn festival at the Arcola Theatre, this is truly a show of two contrasting halves. In the first part, the audience are treated to a rather melancholy and sombre interpretation of Pierrot Lunaire that is difficult to understand.

Formed of a selection of 21 poems from Otto Erich Hartleben’s German translation of Albert Giraud’s cycle of French poems, Schoenberg’s melodrama doesn’t feel as though it has much purpose. This is where Constella ballet and orchestra come in.