The UK’s Glyndebourne festival has announced a bumper summer at the box office for 2014. Overall viewing figures were double those achieved last year, with shows reaching around 200,000 people via a combination of free online broadcasts and live audiences – 95 per cent of a total possible 98,000 tickets were sold.
The 2014 festival, which presented new productions of Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier, Mozart’s La Finta Giardiniera and Verdi’s La traviata, alongside revivals of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Handel’s Rinaldo, closed on 24 August.
David Pickard, general director of Glyndebourne, said: ‘I am delighted that, as well as maintaining our high artistic standards and international reputation for discovering exciting young artists, Glyndebourne’s 2014 festival reached broader audiences than ever before. ‘As a privately funded festival, I am particularly proud that we are the only UK opera company to offer our performances for free online to be accessed by audiences right across the globe.’
He added: ‘Those streamings, together with the success of our dedicated under-30s performance, were highlights of the season for me. I hope that all those who saw festival 2014 operas, whether on [the] stage, on-screen or online went away with a new, or renewed, love of live opera.’
Glyndebourne’s under 30s scheme is free to join for 16-29 year olds and provides subsidised tickets to the festival – an exclusive performance of Rinaldo for the under-30s sold out all 1,200 seats.
Next year’s 2015 festival will open with the first professionally staged UK performance of Donizetti’s Poliuto conducted by Enrique Mazzola and directed by Mariame Clément. The programme features Handel’s Saul, directed by Barrie Kosky with Ivor Bolton conducting the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, directed by David McVicar with Glyndebourne music director Robin Ticciati conducting OAE; London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Ticciati in a revival of the 2012 Ravel double bill of L’Heure Espagnole and L’Enfant et les sortilèges, directed by Laurent Pelly; a revival of the Glyndebourne Tour 2013 production of Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, and a revival of David McVicar’s 2002 production of Carmen.
The festival will also present the world premiere of Macbeth by Glyndebourne’s Young Composer in Residence, Luke Styles.
