Grange Park Opera

About

It was like a fairytale and it began with a Duchess. When she died aged 99, she couldn’t have imagined that her ashes would be carefully placed in the orchestra pit of an opera house – and a rather extraordinary opera house at that. One modelled on the horseshoe shape of La Scala and tucked behind ancient walled gardens where children ran amok and fierce games of croquet were thrashed out.

Productions take place at the Theatre in the Woods, a new five-tier opera house based on Milan's La Scala, seating 750. Since 2017, more than 30,000 have been to the five-tier opera house at 500 year old West Horsley Place, which was inherited in 2015 by author and broadcaster Bamber Gascoigne from his aunt Mary, Duchess of Roxburghe.

Founded in 1998 by Wasfi Kani OBE, the company has staged more than 75 operas, including acclaimed productions of Rusalka, Tristan und Isolde and Peter Grimes. Fiddler on the Roof with Bryn Terfel was staged as part of the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall.

Grange Park Opera has become an integral part of the English summer season. The audience – invariably, but not exclusively in black tie and cocktail dresses – arrive in the afternoon and there are 47 vintage cars to hand to ferry you from London . . . Or the railway station. They have a glass of champagne at The White Wisteria Champagne Bar, and wander leisurely through this magical demi-Eden.

In the long, convivial interval, the audience can settle into one of the two restaurants: either inside the 15th-century house, where Henry VIII once enjoyed a 35-course luncheon, or in The Walnut Tree Restaurant. Alternatively they can book a picnic pavilion in the Crinkle- Crankle garden, on the Croquet Lawn, in the Rose Parterre. Then there are those who just fling their rugs under an ancient gnarled tree in the orchard.

And once the opera ends, the audience walks out into magical moonlit English woodland, watched by fairies and fireflies.

Please visit the website for details of the 2020 season.