Santa Fe Opera Review: The Fresh in the Familiar

The summer program—featuring ‘Die Walküre,’ ‘The Marriage of Figaro,’ ‘La Bohème,’ ‘Rigoletto’ and ‘The Turn of the Screw’—offers largely standard repertoire enriched with subtle surprises and compelling performances.

By 

Heidi Waleson

Aug. 4, 2025 at 4:30 pm ET

Ryan Speedo Green and Tamara Wilson in ‘Die Walküre.’ PHOTO: SANTA FE OPERA/CURTIS BROWN

Santa Fe, N.M.

This summer’s Santa Fe Opera season, which runs through Aug. 23, skews toward standard repertoire, but there were surprises within that narrow compass. Director Melly Still gave Wagner’s “Die Walküre” a feminist gloss: Its women see clearly, while Wotan’s betrayal of his children, however agonizing and supposedly for the greater good, is the inevitable result of his lust for power.

The walls of designer Leslie Travers’s abstract environment are made of stretchy cords; shadowy figures lurk behind and slip through them. The past, present and future of the “Ring” universe exist simultaneously, and someone is always watching, whether it’s Fricka witnessing the meeting of Siegmund and Sieglinde, or Alberich jeering at Wotan. The Valkyries’ costumes (also by Mr. Travers) invoke powerful women like Joan of Arc and Madame Defarge, yet Wotan controls them—his black-clad soldiers drag them away when they try to protect the errant Brünnhilde. In the final tableau, two expectant mothers—Sieglinde and Alberich’s unnamed woman—stare at each other across Brünnhilde’s fiery bier, foreshadowing the conflict that requires two more operas to resolve. I’d be interested in Ms. Still’s take on those.

For his role debut as Wotan, bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green husbanded his resources into a careful portrayal; his savage chastisement of Brünnhilde in Act 3 hinted at future development. Tamara Wilson was a steely, efficient Brünnhilde, her static demeanor gaining some nuance after she shed her warrior garb. Tiny and intense, Vida Miknevičiūtė was the evening’s hit, her crystalline soprano giving explosive voice to Sieglinde’s long-crushed spirit. Mezzo Sarah Saturnino was a formidable, dogged Fricka. Jamez McCorkle brought a lyric desperation to the beleaguered Siegmund, but his tenor lacked the metallic core needed to sustain this punishing role. With his thundering bass, Soloman Howard’s Hunding was a man who lives by violence. The Santa Fe Opera Orchestra sounds better than usual this season, although conductor James Gaffigan’s sluggish pacing made for some longueurs.

Liv Redpath and Riccardo Fassi in ‘The Marriage of Figaro.’ PHOTO: SANTA FE OPERA/BRONWEN SHARP

Laurent Pelly’s production of Mozart’s “The Marriage of Figaro” is much improved over its first outing at the company in 2021, no doubt because Mr. Pelly was able to supervise the staging in person this time. (In 2021, Covid-19 meant he directed via Zoom.) Chantal Thomas’s revolving set, inspired by a clock mechanism, made its point about the intricate ensemble nature of the opera, while Mr. Pelly’s direction—and his handsome 1930s-era costumes—balanced humor with the seriousness of the issues at stake.

Riccardo Fassi was a deftly comic Figaro; Liv Redpath an exquisite Susanna. Ailyn Pérez, a late substitution as the Countess, sounded tight at first, but her soprano soon bloomed. With his dark baritone, Florian Sempey played up the Count’s disagreeable characteristics, making his final capitulation all the more striking. Hongni Wu was a delightfully eager Cherubino; Maurizio Muraro and Steven Colewere hilarious as Doctor Bartolo and Basilio, the Count’s enablers. Conductor Harry Bicket’s sprightly tempi complemented Mr. Pelly’s precise pacing.

Lightly updated to the 1920s, James Robinson’s touching production of Puccini’s “La Bohème” subtly emphasized the opera’s theme of poverty. Allen Moyer’s sets told that story: When their Act 1 garret reappeared in Act 4, most of the Bohemians’ few possessions were gone, no doubt pawned or sold, and the Café Momus, rather than a working-class hangout, was a fancy restaurant with chandeliers and patrons in evening dress looking askance at the shabby artists celebrating a fleeting windfall. Drunken veterans and an ambulance repurposed for prostitution suggested the grim aftermath of the war, while a cemetery glimpsed in Act 3 foreshadowed Mimì’s fate.

The lively ensemble cast featured Sylvia D’Eramo as a dreamy, fragile Mimì; Long Long’s solid Rodolfo; Szymon Mechliński as a voluble Marcello; and Emma Marhefka’sexuberant Musetta, who got the evening’s most fabulous costume, a black fur-and-feathers number designed by Constance Hoffman. Duane Schuler’s acute lighting—Mimì and Rodolfo have their first tryst by moonlight—and Iván López Reynoso’ssensitive conducting further enhanced the evening.

Soloman Howard, Long Long, Sylvia D’Eramo, Emma Marhefka, Szymon Mechliński and Efraín Solís in ‘La Bohème.’ PHOTO: SANTA FE OPERA/CURTIS BROWN

No new enlightenment was to be had in Julien Chavaz’s take on Verdi’s “Rigoletto.”Designers Jamie Vartan (sets) and Jean-Jacques Delmotte (costumes) suggested a Renaissance-themed carnival, with colored flashing lights on geometric cutouts and a brocade wallpaper design that was echoed in the burgundy costumes of the ensemble members, who formed a dancing chorus line during some of the arias. A legion of standing lamps served no particular purpose.

Michael Chioldi, a late replacement, powered his way through the title role. Elena Villalón was an appealing Gilda, convincing in her depiction of an innocent girl’s first (and fatally, last) love. Duke Kim was a properly callous Duke of Mantua, his leather jacket contrasting with the Renaissance tunics of his courtiers. Monterone’s curse was a high point, thanks to Le Bu’s thunderous bass-baritone. He was able to prevail over Carlo Montanaro’s noisy, unsubtle conducting, which frequently covered the other singers.

Jacquelyn Stucker in ‘The Turn of the Screw.’ PHOTO: SANTA FE OPERA/CURTIS BROWN

The season’s best show was “The Turn of the Screw,” highlighted by Gemma New’s incisive conducting of Britten’s eerie chamber orchestration, its spareness intensifying the opera’s atmosphere of ever-increasing dread. (It has, alas, the shortest run, with the last of its four performances on Aug. 5.) With her rich soprano, Jacquelyn Stucker captured the frightened, resolute Governess; tenor Brenton Ryan’shigh-class English accent and insinuating melismas made the ghost Peter Quint the embodiment of evil; Jennifer Johnson Cano’s staunch but clueless Mrs. Grose added to the Governess’s isolation.

There’s no ambiguity in Louisa Muller’s staging. The ghosts are present; the only question is whether they or the Governess will prevail in the struggle for the children—Flora (Annie Blitz) and Miles (Everett Baumgarten). Designer Christopher Oramcreated tall windows and distressed walls for Bly, the country house. All the locations—including the lake out of which the other ghost, Miss Jessel (Wendy Bryn Harmer), materializes—are inside. This added to the work’s claustrophobia, as did the black Victorian dresses of the three adult women and Malcolm Rippeth’s creepy lighting. Ms. Muller’s directing flowed through the scenes and orchestral interludes, constructing a seamless, terrifying arc from the Governess’s anxious journey to Bly to her final wail over the dead Miles and her walk into the lake, the last victim of Peter Quint.