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The Classical Opera Company was founded in 1997 by conductor Ian Page. It specialises in the music of Mozart and his contemporaries, performing with its own period-instrument orchestra, and is emerging as one of Britain’s most exciting and highly regarded young arts organisations. It has attracted considerable critical and public acclaim, not only for the high quality of its performances but also for its imaginative programming and, in particular, its ability to discover and nurture outstanding young singers.
“The Classical Opera Company feel like a true ensemble, and their generous acting and musicianship made the evening a joy from start to finish.” The Independent on Sunday
“My personal pick for giving this year is the Classical Opera Company's glorious The A-Z of Mozart Opera, which is fresh, diverse, insightful and illuminating (everything that such recital anthologies usually fail to be).” David Vickers, Gramophone
23rd May 2010
“Ian Page's subtle survey explores the development of certain textures...Ailish Tynan, Sophie Bevan and Anna Stéphany blend beautifully in the brief trio from Paride ed Elena...the playing is consistently incisive.”
26th June 2010
“In January, Ian Page’s young British troupe ransacked the [Gluck] treasure house with delightful results in a Wigmore Hall concert. And here it is, with Sophie Bevan wonderfully anguished in her aria from Alceste, Anna Stéphany darkly dramatic...[Page's group are] incisively suave.”
September 2010
“...there is some first-rate dramatic music here...Sophie Bevan sings the Tito excerpt with such intensity as to make one almost sympathise with Sesto...'Che Faro' [is] taken at a cracking pace by Ian Page and sung with desperate urgency by Anna Stephany...This is a terrific, unmissable disc.”
September 2010
****
“The three singers here all make a good showing, Ailish Tynan with her direct engagement with recitative...and as a sentient, fearful Euridice...[Stéphany] scores highly as Clytemnestra in Iphigénie en Aulide, her smoky timbre encompassing the anger of Agamemnon's wife...Sophie Bevan cuts a charmingly determined figure as Colette”
September 2010
“Conductor, instrumentalists and singers alike, mirroring Gluck's reformist aims from the 1760s onwards, make sounds the servant of the sense, with stylish, eloquent and dramatic music-making of the highest order”
23rd January 2011
***
“[Gluck's] music is fiery. Ian Page understands this, as his live recording of excerpts from a dozen operas bears witness. His soloists deliver the long-breathed melodic lines expressively, and Anna Stéphany is a strong Clytemnestra.”
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