If ever Vaughan Williams' most ambitious opera were going to get another production - it has not been seen on stage since 1954 - then this was the year to do it, the 50th anniversary of the composer's death. But none of the major opera houses has plucked up the courage to tackle The Pilgrim's Progress. ENO's horizons can't extend beyond the 40 minutes of his Riders to the Sea, and so it was left to the Philharmonia to do justice to one of Vaughan Williams' most remark-able, if flawed, achievements, with a semi-staging in conjunction with Richard Hickox's continuing symphonies cycle.
The symphonic connection is appropriate, for those who have never had the chance to hear Pilgrim's Progress live will at least have heard the parts of the score the composer incorporated into his Fifth Symphony. That work, with its themes heavily reliant on perfect fourths and fifths, also defines the soundworld of Vaughan Williams' treatment of Bunyan's allegory. Dramatically, it is uneven: the entire first act, and at least the close of the last are glorious, uplifting and genuinely moving, but the dramatic pulse weakens in the middle pair of acts.
David Edwards' staging - minimal props, modern casual dress - did all that was necessary. Hickox conducted with the authoritative familiarity that makes him pre-eminent in this repertory, and the cast was a roster of the finest young British singers of today. Roderick Williams was perfectly suited to the role of the Pilgrim, singing with honeyed expressiveness and the right amount of wide-eyed innocence, while Neal Davies as an eloquent Bunyan provided the prologue and epilogue. Those who took on multiple roles included Sarah Fox, Sarah Tynan, Pamela Helen Stephen, Matthew Brook, Matthew Rose, Gidon Saks, Andrew Kennedy and James Gilchrist; it was really quite a special occasion.
