I'm afraid I "just missed" MASK OF ORPHEUS, as I had just left ENO at the time, and was elsewhere  

It's a great pity no video record was kept of the performance (at least, I'm not aware of one?).

HRB, Ron? Whoever it is, those people are some of the unsung heroes of opera production!

It's a long time ago but my recollection is of relatively simple ritualistic and 'hieratic' (is that the word?) movement and stage setting with brilliantly imaginative use of lighting and changing backdrop. I seem to remember most clearly a spectacular fiery sun slowly sinking as Philip Langridge's Orpheus moved almost as slowly and timelessly in silhouette in front to it. The whole thing looked glorious, rich reds and yellows, occasionally cropped brutally by black. Most of the singers and actors were masked. In fact I have a feeling everyone was masked including the three main protagonists (Orpheus, Euridice and Aristaeus) but am ready to be corrected on that. Each of these main characters was represented three times over by a singer, a puppet (with their own off-stage singer?) and a mime, often sumultaneously and, as many actions were repeated as well, you got many different views of the same event both spatially and across time. It was very much ritual, I was going was going to say as opposed to a drama but that isn't right. Ritual drama/ dramatic ritual (and it ruddy well worked as such too, even if we had all just come in out of 20th century London and went back out into it again afterwards). Marie Angel as The Oracle of the Dead had a spectacular 'costume' which occupied a large part of the stage IIRC and was quite alarming in itself. Big set-piece sections with the stage full of richly costumed 'archetypal' figures, contrasted with sometimes a single character (usually Langridge who was just superhuman in the part) alone on a vast stage.

I can remember the general visual 'effect' of the staging and the deliberate slow gestural movements but not so much the detail. Maybe others who saw it can remember rather better?

  

You do, and (having done quite a bit of it myself in the past) also you certainly get to know the opera(s) extremely well!

There's no people like show people.
They smile when they are low.
Even with a turkey that you know will fold,
You may be stranded out in the cold.
Still you wouldn't trade it for a sack of gold.
Let's go on with the show!


   

Crumbs, that sounds like a job and a half you had, opilec, or perhaps two jobs. On the plus side, not everyone would be able to tell if the copyists had made a mistake or am I being a Philistine?

Yes, I think I'll have a good listen to the CDs first and then tackle the booklets afterwards, with a magnifying glass. So far, the fact that the myth is so familiar is quite helpful to deriving a vague idea about (some of) what's going on from the words.

And Britain.  I can't readily think of any Brit conductors - especially opera conductors, but not only - who haven't come up through the route of repetiteur work.

Whereas in Russia I can only think of about two who have.