Boston Stages William Tell for the First Time in 150 Years

Boston Lyric Opera marked its fiftieth anniversary with the first staged Guillaume Tell in the city in over 150 years, sung in French and trimmed from roughly four hours of music to two and a half. Montagu James itemises what went, the Act I and III ballets, the Act II hunters' chorus, the Mathilde and Arnold duet, and notes these cuts were milder than most. He is specific about the singing, with Konu Kim's effortless Asile hereditaire the standout and George Gagnidze's Tell a mixed evening of muffled diction redeemed by one convincing Sois immobile, and he is unpersuaded by the dystopian staging's Alpine postcard projections and CGI storm. The argument underneath is about programming: that a regional company builds an audience faster on an ambitious neglected work than on another run at the canon.