“The towering central performance of Sarah Connolly. Singing with coruscating power, acting with white-hot intensity, she makes Medea’s journey from mother to monster, via jealousy and humiliation, nightmarishly plausible.”
Richard Morrison, The Times, 17 February 2013
“Connolly, at the peak of her powers, has done nothing finer: she takes us with her every step of the way on a terrifying emotional journey.”
Tim Ashley, The Guardian, 17 February 2013
“Sarah Connolly carries all before her in the title-role: here is an artist majestically in her prime, singing with total technical assurance and radiating baneful charisma.”
Rupert Christiansen, The Telegraph, 17 February 2013
“Sarah Connolly is excellent at stepping up to the extraordinariness of the role: her singing, along with her dramatic presence, is the indispensable factor of the show.”
Matthew Ingleby, Play to See, 16 February 2013
“A power-suited Sarah Connolly stands apart. Her Medea chafes against the confines of her role and gender, exploited then discarded at the whim of a libidinous husband. Vocally dwarfing her colleagues, her struggle to repress herself into this world of social hierarchies is mirrored visually and musically. Forging her own path through Charpentier’s fluid tempo-transitions and moods, she never lets her hand slip from the psychological string that guides us through the endless corners and corridors of recit. Her miniature aria of grief once Jason’s abandonment is certain coaxes tears, while her final invocation of the forces of Hell partners that earlier fragility with a reckless blood-lust. We feel for her, even as we know the small, pyjama-clad bodies are coming, and in her final ascent (not descent, interestingly) to darkness she is at once magnificent and horrifying.”
Alexandra Coghlan, The Arts Desk, 16 February 2013
“The disintegration from the elegantly coiffed princess of the first act to the dishevelled harpy summoning the powers of hell to avenge her showed the singer at her formidable best. In the big aria “Is this what love is worth?” Connolly vividly evokes a woman losing her grip on all that she values and turning to the path of utter destructive fury.”
Sebastian Petit, Opera Britannia, 16 February 2013
“In the title role Sarah Connolly was on fire. Over the course of a gripping staging the formidable mezzo-soprano descended from sophisticated power-dresser to bug-eyed monster, and she did so with utter conviction each step of the way towards her final coup de théâtre. Her singing was not only beautiful it was also alive to every nuance both in the score and in Christopher Cowell’s excellent translation. “Vengeance must learn to wear a mask” declares Medea early on – which is exactly what Connolly did until the moment when, blade in hand, she ripped the mask away and all Hades broke loose.”
Mark Valencia, Classical Source, 16 February 2013
“The A-list cast is, as one would hope, A-list magnificent. As Medea, Sarah Connolly is at her vocal and dramatic best, with a powerful and technically superb voice that conveys Medea’s rage and anguish – she stands out even amongst a stellar cast.”
Julia Savage, Bachtrack.com, 18 February 2013
“The first thing that must be said of this UK stage premiere is that Connolly’s presence in it is its greatest strength. The word “presence” is overused but in her case the voice and manner exude it. Her commitment to each idea, each word, each musical inflection has been thought and felt through – and when she is not on the stage you feel her in absentia.”
Edward Seckerson, 16 February 2013
“In an opera peopled by morally frail, dishonest men, Sarah Connolly portrays Medea as a powerful heroine driven by a combination of fiery anger, eloquent finesse and sharp intelligence. From the opening of Act 1 the profound depths of her character are evident: her passionate love, her jealousy, her pride, her tenderness. It is the powers at her command which set her apart, as is evident in the pulsing accompaniment of her first recitative and the tempestuous cascading string lines which frame it. Her softer side is revealed in Act 2, accompanied by strings and dulcet recorders, preparing us for the pathos of her brutal, inhuman murder of her children in order to inflict pain upon the man who has rejected her. Connolly’s compassion as a mother was evident throughout Act 2, and her powerful soliloquies in Act 3, when she laments Jason’s betrayal and the futility of her love and loyalty, evoked tender empathy in the audience, before her invocation of Satanic darkness injected her thoughtfulness with a terrifying, nihilistic blackness, inspiring both terror and wonder. In her aria-moments Connolly combined warm, shapely lyricism with an elegant declamation of the text, ever alert to Charpentier’s unique arioso which is itself responsive to both word and affekt.”
Claire Seymour, Opera Today, 17 February 2013
“[Charpentier’s Medea] provides a gift of a vehicle for one of our great singing actresses, Sarah Connolly. She’s not a woman to be trifled with, and Charpentier charts her spiralling descent from insecure lover to unhinged filicide in music of extraordinary emotional power. Connolly’s assumption of the role is not only characterised by singing of immense beauty but she even manages (with the help of Euripides and Charpentier) to make us sympathise with this wronged woman.”
Barry Millington, Evening Standard, 18 February 2013
“Connolly gives a performance which is at once commanding and heart-rending: the long recitative in which she is transformed from a scorned and self-harming wife into an avenging fury has blistering authenticity…her singing – with its very high tessitura – is a delight.
Michael Church, The Independent, 18 February 2013
“Sarah Connolly on magnificent form as Medea.”
William Hartston, The Express, 18 February 2013
“Sarah Connolly’s business-suited interpretation is still and steely, gradually ratcheting up the tension, as injustice at her husband’s infidelity eats at her soul and unthinkable violence becomes her only resort.”
Simon Thomas, What’s on Stage, 19 February 2013
“It was Sarah Connolly who suggested Charpentier to the management, and there is no mezzo-soprano today better equipped to impersonate his monster-mother from Greek mythology. Connolly’s refined timbre and sure musical instincts are the ideal medium for Charpentier’s highly charged but chaste idiom. Thanks to her skill at harmonising the human qualities of the part in the first two acts with its heinous qualities in the last two, Connolly enjoys a deserved triumph.”
Andrew Clark, Financial Times, 18 February 2013
“Connolly’s incandescent performance may have been the largest single factor in the production’s success..That act belonged wholesale to Connolly, who in both voice and bearing brought a sense of vulnerable humanity into her imperious performance.”
Erica Jeal, Opera, April 2013