LE FIGARO - Thierry Hillériteau

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This inaugural concert is a reflection of his project. Modern, unexpected, elegant. We laugh heartily at the jokes of actor Nicolas Carpentier, who retraces in a roundabout way the history of the place and the challenges of the project. The guest-star appearance of Sam, the chef's chihuahua, is memorable. The rest of the evening is in tune.

When, in the middle of her La Finta Giardiniera aria, the soprano Sandrine Piau rebels against the condition made to women at the opera, parade behind her

photos of Simone Weil and Simone Veil.

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FRANCE MEDIA AGENCY

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(...) Saturday evening, the surprise program (Mozart, Carl Maria von Weber and Beethoven) invited young talents of French singing (Sandrine Piau, Anaïk Morel, Stanislas de Barbeyrac, Florian Sempey) as well as the pianist Bertrand Chamayou.

Lighting and video projections  gave an innovative touch - flashy some would say - to this opening concert.

Laurence Equilbey displays her desire to "experiment, by focusing on the intersection of disciplines or new technologies, such as video or even mapping".

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THE WORLD - Marie-Aude Roux

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Laurence Equilbey has promised a surprise program.  It is also a cheeky choice. Long extracts from La Finta Giardiniera, by Mozart, in the Singspiel version

German, Die Gartnerin aus Liebe,  with a brilliant skewer of French singers - tenor Stanislas de Barbeyrac, baritone Florian Sempey, mezzo Anaik

Morel and the soprano Sandrine Piau, whose mastery and musicality command admiration. Confirmed actress, she will interrupt with ease the ferne air von ihrem Neste ("Far from its nest, the turtledove moans"), on the pretext that these presuppositions from another age no longer hold true. 

A feminist gallery will then be invited to the screens behind the orchestra, from Simone de Beauvoir to Virginia Woolf, from Indira Gandhi to Simone Weil,

from suffragettes to Femen.

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Laurence Equilbey drives the point home with humor, a way of promulgating a few manifestos. Basically, the denunciation of the subordinate and minimal place of women in the performing arts.

For the form, the implementation of what one could call  "The augmented concert",   visual and technological means, from surtitles to video, from work on lights to theatrical security.

Thus, the role of Mr. Loyal played by the actor Nicolas Charpentier will take its marks in the evocation of the industrial origins of the place, a melting pot of social demands for the working-class condition.  

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Ovation for this kick-off with generous prospects.  

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THE CROSS  - Emmanuelle Giuliani

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Laurence Equilbey, in residence in Boulogne with her Insula Orchestra, had imagined a festive concert having to fulfill several objectives: to make the auditorium sound of course and to show the technical possibilities (sharpness of the acoustics, sound effects of the spoken voice , light effects, spatialization

soloists and choristers in the room…), honoring Insula's favorite repertoire - from Mozart to Weber - but also delivering some social and political messages on the role of music in our troubled times.

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To the actor Nicolas Carpentier returned the delicate mission of telling in a humorous mode (which often fell flat but without much damage)

the history of Seguin Island while, projected onto a string of screens in the back of the stage, explicit images took the pretext of the libretto of Die Gärterin aus

Liebe to recall here the feminist struggles, there the social struggles and, finally, the need to fulfill one's duty as a citizen by going to vote.

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When the face of the new president was revealed, we obviously discovered that of… Mozart! This mixture of naivety and militant fervor, of kitsch

(the summit to be reached with the illustration of the devils of Freischütz) had something rather nice ...

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OPERA MAGAZINE - Richard Martet

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Laurence Equilbey, founder of Insula Orchestra imagines an extremely original program composed of extracts from Die Gartnenn ans Liebe by Mozart and Der Freischutz by Weber followed by Beethoven's Fantaise for piano choir and orchestra. It benefits from a staging by Olivier Fredj, calling on an actor  (the excellent Nicolas Carpentier), whose speeches, mixing with good humor references to the history of Seguin Island and to the works presented, serve both as a link and as a common thread.  The singers, in evening dress, enter from all sides of the room, "play" as if they were in the theater served by an acoustics of exceptional clarity, reverberated but not too much, by sumptuous lighting effects and by very successful video projections on screens at the back of the stage.

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OLYRIX - Joël Jégard

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Hosted and commented by the actor Nicolas Carpentier, helmet in hand, this evening is placed under the sign of quality and originality. Throughout the concert, his interventions are noticed. At the same time a skilful storyteller and wielding humor in a high dose, he leads the public in this patchwork musical program and in this exceptional site.