Victorian Opera opens its 2020 season with Richard Strauss’ short, sharp sensation. Directed by Cameron Menzies, this production is perhaps the company’s most impressive yet. While the concept of theatrical falsehood takes some fathoming, it’s visually enthralling and unnerving. More importantly, this Salome is musically exciting, especially with Vida Miknevičiūtė in the title role, and Orchestra Victoria is in top form.

Vida Miknevičiūtė in Victorian Opera’s Salome. Photo © Craig Fuller

Premiering in Dresden in 1905, Salome was adapted from Oscar Wilde’s play by the composer. Revolutionary and unrelentingly intense, Strauss’ music was as sensational as this one-act opera’s story of illicit desires. Based on the biblical episode about John the Baptist, here called Jokanaan, it tells of this holy man’s imprisonment for denouncing the marriage of King Herod and his brother’s wife, Herodias. Her daughter, Salome, has become Herod’s object of desire, while she in turn develops a strange obsession with Jokanaan. He rejects Salome, so when Herod asks her to dance she demands Jokanaan’s head as reward.

Making her role and Victorian Opera debut, Lithuanian soprano Vida Miknevičiūtė was captivating as Salome on opening night. Her voice’s shimmering tone, power and expressiveness –...