Even with Franz Schubert’s great successes writing for the voice, his 11 attempts at opera never got him very far. One is being staged in Garsington now. What’s it like? “Schubert was one of the greatest songwriters who ever lived, yet there are only two arias in two-and-a-half hours of music. The whole opera has been conceived in terms of vast blocks of end-to-end ensemble: which are incredibly rich in their musical development, but at the same time make the opera a total nightmare to stage.” – The Guardian