“Rose embodies the Mephistophelean ‘spirit of negation’ – the star of the show.”
Hugh Canning, The Sunday Times, 24 June 2012
“The triumph was Matthew Rose’s utterly compelling Claggart, sung with immense strength, colour and penetration, and superb in his Iago-like soliloquy explaining to himself why Budd in all his beauty must be destroyed. In fact, Alden’s directing of Rose’s Claggart was as virtuoso as anything he has done… a real tour de force.”
Tom Sutcliffe, Opera Now, September 2012
“Matthew Rose’s Claggart was strongly sung on ink-black tone. The last sentence of his monologue, launched pianissimo, was properly spine-chilling.”
Rodney Milnes, Opera, August 2012
“[Claggart was] brilliantly acted and sung by the bass Matthew Rose — decades younger than James Morris, the venerable artist who sang the role in the Met’s revival in May — the master-at-arms was pale and wide-eyed, seemingly shellshocked by the trauma of his own secrets. He emanated the anger that arises out of great frustration. Restrained and intense, Mr. Rose’s performance was as powerful and troubling a representation of the enervating effects of the closet — effects demonstrated by the resolute aloofness of Britten’s opera — as Heath Ledger’s in ‘Brokeback Mountain’.”
Zachary Woolfe, New York Times, 03 July 2012
“The most provocative interpretation was that of Claggart, the corrupt master-of-arms, played by Matthew Rose, winner of the 2012 Critics’ Circle exceptional young talent award. Delivering his vocal lines with unsnarling warmth of tone, he added complexity to the role, pacing back and forth in obsessive straight lines and suggesting a terrible, bottled-up hatred. For the first time you could believe that Claggart himself once possessed a similar, Billy-type “handsome sailor” beauty before life, in some unspoken way, betrayed him… Rose’s Claggart alone is worth the ticket.”
Fiona Maddocks, The Observer, 24 June 2012
“In an impressive cast, no one is finer than Matthew Rose. As Claggart, one of his biggest roles to date, he present a chilling study in evil, dressed in a long leather coat and all the more powerful for his moon-faced impassivity. He sculpts the words with his dark bass-baritone.”
John Allison, The Sunday Telegraph, 24 June 2012
“[Matthew Rose] brought vocal power and ominous shadings to his performance.”
Anthony Tommasini, New York Times, 25 June 2012
“Matthew Rose lends Claggart the impassivity of a sphinx, the physique of a wrestler and the snarl of a devil.”
Andrew Clark, Financial Times, 20 May 2012
“On stage Matthew Rose was the star of the show: a granitic monster of a Claggart, vocalised with chilling authority.”
Rupert Christiansen, The Telegraph, 20 June 2012
“…the master-at-arms John Claggart, dominates the stage, especially as chillingly sung by bass Matthew Rose…[his voice] so well-focused and perversely beautiful in tone that we hang on his every word.”
Mike Silverman, Associated Press, 24 June 2012
“Matthew Rose’s Claggart is terrifying – not for any obvious malevolence, but for the contained cruelty that his impassive presence projects, delivering his credo towards the end of the first act while fondling the neckerchief he has taken from Budd.”
Andrew Clements, The Guardian, 19 June 2012
“Matthew Rose’s Claggart projects a chilling magnificence that steals the show, sung with dark but incisive clarity.”
Michael White, The Telegraph, 19 June 2012
“Matthew Rose’s Claggart is a terrific achievement from this rising bass (winner of the Critics’ Circle award for exceptional young talent).”
Richard Morrison, The Times, 20 June 2012
“Matthew Rose’s indomitably cruel Claggart.”
Edward Seckerson, 19 June 2012
“Praise be for Matthew Rose, the pasty-faced nasty who was last night the saving grace of the leading roles…Rose is a perceptive actor with a richly expressive bass voice, and conveyed his malignant character (a Iago, if you like) with a still concentration in his body and sudden, arresting contortions of his mouth. The performance of the night.”
Ismene Brown, The Arts Desk, 19 June 2012
“Matthew Rose gives a terrifying account of that meaty role; on the whole he is quiet, almost drugged, and he paces the stage slowly to creepy effect. Rose’s voice is now richer than ever, so his evil ‘Credo’ has every colour and a vast dynamic range.”
Michael Tanner, The Spectator, 30 June 2012