Fiordiligi to the fore: Korean soprano Soyeon Shin shines in a fine young ensemble for Scherzo Ensemble’s trimmed yet still full-fat performance of Cosi fan tutte

Mozart: Cosi fan tutte – Soyeon Shin, Max Robbins, Anna Gregg, Michal Karski, Aina Magnell, Samuel Pantcheff – Scherzo Ensemble at Smith Square Hall

Mozart: Cosi fan tutte (the essential cut);  Soyeon Shin, Aina Magnell, Max Robbins, Samuel Pantcheff, Anna Greg, Michal Karski, Scherzo Ensemble, director: Bobbie-Jean Henning, conductor: Matthew O’Keeffe; Smith Square Hall
Reviewed 17 August 2026

A shining performance from Korean soprano Soyeon Shin anchors a trimmed account of the opera giving a somewhat comic spin yet featuring strong, stylish performances from a promising young cast.

At the beginning of July, Matthew O’Keeffe and Scherzo Ensemble presented their annual opera performances at Longhope Opera in Hampshire. This year it was Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte with a fine young cast including the Korean soprano Soyeon Shin as Fiordiligi. The plan was to bring the production back, in somewhat trimmed form as ‘the essential cut’ for performances at Sinfonia Smith Square and in Hampshire (in aid of Hammersley Homes). As ever with opera production, things did not quite go according to plan.

We caught Scherzo Ensemble’s performance of Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte at Sinfonia Smith Square on Monday 17 August 2026 with Matthew O’Keeffe conducting an ensemble of nine instrumentalists. The cast and production were based on the Longhope performances but with a new Dorabella, Ferrando and Guglielmo!  Soyeon Shin was Fiordiligi, Aina Magnell was Dorabella, Max Robbins was Ferrando, Samuel Pantcheff was Guglielmo (we last saw him in one of the title roles of The Gondoliers with ETO last year, see my review), Michal Karski was Don Alfonso and Anna Gregg as Despina. The production was directed by Bobbie-Jean Henning with designs by Anna Dell Bradford.

Mozart: Cosi fan tutte – Anna Gregg, Michal Karski at Longhope Opera (Photo: Ches Gunner)

Bobbie-Jean Henning’s production was modern dress with simple but effective sets by Anna Dell Bradford based around screens. In view of both time constraints and the last-minute changes to cast, they opted to perform the work without the recitatives, an intriguing and challenging choice. Instead, we had a spoken narrative that veered towards the comic, delivered by an apparently random audience member. The result was undoubtedly effective and (largely) informative. Though clearly enjoyed by many of the audience, the narrator did sometimes outstay her welcome.

That the performance worked was owing to the strong accounts of the solo roles from all concerned. Once you coped with the loss of recitatives, you got a pretty full account of the opera (Guglielmo and Ferrando got both their arias) and all concerned impressed both with their musicality and stagecraft.

Henning’s approach veered towards the comic, taking a somewhat lighter view of the work than some and that included choreographed moments in some of the ensembles which was definitely a first for me in a Mozart opera! The ending was tweaked in the modern manner without doing too much violence to the plot. 

The approach could not be all fun and frolic however as the performance was anchored by the superb account of Fiordiligi’s two arias by Soyeon Shin. She is an immensely stylish and serious performer, her performance bringing out all the opera seria influences in Mozart’s writing (in fact, during ‘Come scoglio’ I started thinking that Vitellia in La clemenza di Tito would be a good fit for her). Shin was not completely serious, in the ensembles she had some delightful moments and paired wonderfully with Aina Magnell’s Dorabella. Magnell’s voice had a vibrant warmth to it allied to a brightness that blended with Shin’s soprano. The two formed a youthfully engaging double-act, very much modern young women and their charm was one of the delights of the opera. So much so, that I regretted the lack of their recitative dialogues.

As their lovers, Max Robbins and Samuel Pantcheff were definitely highly contrasting. Robbins sang with a lovely suave tone which suited his Act One aria ‘Un’aura amorosa’ admirably. In Act Two, his aria was similarly stylishly sung, but here felt rather less dark, and I wanted him to dig deeper. Though I have to admit it fitted in with the production. Pantcheff made a robust, swaggering Guglielmo, charming in both of his arias and joining in with Robbins in all sorts of liveliness and physicality. Their disguises were simply loud clothes though both wore false facial hair. I was uncertain whether the problems with this were incidental or deliberate (particularly as Anna Gregg’s Despina had similar ‘problem’s with her disguise wig).

Gregg made a feisty and youthful Despina, definitely with a mind of her own and not one to follow orders if she did not want to! The result was a lively foil to the more ladylike and demanding behaviour of the sisters, and Gregg acquitted her arias with character and vividness. Her medico and notary were definitely strongly etched characters though Gregg’s supposedly comic voice took a bit of getting used to. 

Michal Karski was a youthful Don Alfonso, definitely in charge but also having fun with the games he was playing with the two men. Without the recitatives, there was no spark between this Don Alfonso and Despina. Yet Karski managed to hold our attention throughout.

The instrumental ensemble (five strings and four wind) produced a lithe and engaging sound, keeping the faster passages light and bouncy. O’Keeffe’s speeds were on the pacey side and all the better for it. It was a warm evening and there were odd moments which things suffered, but overall the sound was impressive.

This performance worked because the young cast took the opportunities and ran with them. Soyeon Shin was the stand-out artist but she was surrounded by a fine cast, all of whom impressed in one way or another.