Sublime music and riotous comedy with a satirical edge combine in Il viaggio a Reims, Rossini’s masterful comic opera. Set at The Hotel of the Golden Fleur-de-lis, it shows the travails of a group of enthusiastic revellers travelling to celebrate the coronation of a King Charles (of France), and performed in 2023 the year of another similar event.

A group of the pampered and privileged arrive in a spa town on their way to a fabulous coronation, but lost luggage, politics, posturing and romance ensure that even the best-laid plans can go wrong.

Rarely-performed due to the size of the singing company required, the opera shows the ambition and scale of production that can be realised all around the country by English Touring Opera.
Being performed in rep on tour in Hackney, Cheltenham, Cambridge, Buxton, York, Norwich, Canterbury, Exeter, Snape, Chester and Durham.

Photographs by Richard Hubert Smith.