Hänsel and Gretel
Glyndebourne, Sussex

This is the year that Glyndebourne went green (and I am not referring to the lush state of the gardens after the summer rain). A high-profile application to site a wind turbine on Glyndebourne land has been given the go-ahead and from next year the festival has also announced that members of the audience will no longer be allowed to arrive by helicopter. Whatever next? How is any self-respecting prima donna meant to make an entrance?

As if to fall in with the mood of the times, the director Laurent Pelly has decided to give a green slant to Humperdinck’s much-loved fairytale opera Hänsel und Gretel. This is the second new production of the season and Pelly must have seemed a sure-fire choice as director after his hit staging of Donizetti’s La fille du régiment at Covent Garden last year, currently touring the world’s opera houses.