Bluebeard's Castle + Oedipus Rex
Welsh National Opera
- Date night
- Great for groups
- Date
- Thu, 12 Nov 2026
- Time
- 19:30 · 2h 5m
- Venue
- Mayflower Theatre, Southampton
- City
- Southampton
- Tickets
- from £17
You'll be taken to the ensemble's official site.
Summary
Welsh National Opera performs a double bill of Bartók’s Bluebeard's Castle and Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex at the Wales Millennium Centre.
Why it's fantastic
These two twentieth-century masterpieces offer a double bill of psychological intensity and cinematic scale. You can expect a visceral evening that moves from the shadowy mystery of a gothic thriller to a monumental retelling of a Greek tragedy, all delivered through some of the most powerful orchestral writing in opera.
Our guide to this performance
What you'll hear
We are presented with a distinctive double bill of twentieth-century works that explore high psychological drama. The evening begins with Bartók’s Bluebeard's Castle, a compact and shadowy piece known for its lush, dark orchestral colours. You should listen for the way the music shifts to represent the opening of seven different doors, each revealing a new aspect of a hidden inner world. Following this, the mood shifts to the starker, ritualistic world of Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex. This work takes a different approach to storytelling, using a more structured and formal musical language to present a classic Greek tragedy. Together, these two pieces demonstrate the sheer variety of operatic styles developed in the last century, moving from intimate tension to monumental, declamatory power. While the works differ in their musical architecture, they both rely on the orchestra to provide a sense of atmospheric scale that supports the vocal performances.
Who's performing
Welsh National Opera brings this challenging double bill to the stage. As one of the United Kingdom’s leading companies, they are well-regarded for their large-scale touring productions and their ability to handle complex modern repertoire alongside the standard classics. The company is based at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff but maintains a strong presence across several regional hubs. They are known for a robust choral sound and an orchestra that consistently delivers clarity and depth, which is particularly essential for the intricate textures found in both Bartók and Stravinsky.
Planning your evening
The performance takes place at the Mayflower Theatre in Southampton and has a total running time of approximately 125 minutes. This length, combined with the two-part structure, makes it a substantial evening of theatre. As these works were originally written in Hungarian and Latin respectively, you can expect the use of surtitles to follow the narrative. There is no specific dress code for the venue, though most attendees opt for smart-casual attire. The production offers an excellent entry point for those interested in seeing how twentieth-century composers reinterpreted the medium of opera.
Written by the Bravura editorial team from the ensemble's published programme and venue information. We don't reproduce copy from box-office sites. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.
