But, in the case of Georges Bizet, I dare say that he was turning in his grave as soon as he was laid there in 1875, aged 37, just three months after the infamous premiere of his now beloved opera, Carmen.

It is not so much that his work has undergone numerous revisions and adaptations since but that the opera with which Bizet endowed the world was itself so compromised by the composer's obligatory accommodation of his Parisian audience and the Opera-Comique in Paris that he must surely have died wondering why the world could not have seen his theatrical and musical masterpiece for what he initially intended it to be.

Inspired by Prosper Merimee's novel, Bizet's vision for what would be his last opera far exceeded the normal boundaries of the opera comique. The principal roles of Carmen and Don Jose encompassed emotional complexities and a world of dark tragedy that the one-dimensional stereotype of that adored genre would never, by the very nature of the role, venture to explore. Essentially, the opera was written for the wrong audience, a consensus that was felt among the musical community after the composer's death and by virtue of which the decision to replace Bizet's original dialogue with recitative was reached, in an effort to mould the work into something more fitting of the "grand opera" genre, a la Wagner.

One person who obviously considers the opera comique thread to be a more tenuous one than that of the grand opera is Stewart Collins. He has written an English narration to accompany a concert performance of Carmen, and an audaciously humorous one at that. What would Georges Bizet think? This version of the opera was first heard in Iceland recently, under the baton of the Romanian-born conductor Nicolae Moldoveanu, who is to make his Irish conducting debut when the production comes to the Helix in Dublin City University next Friday (8pm) in the company of the RTE Concert Orchestra.

The acclaimed French mezzosoprano Sophie Pondjiclis . . .

already a darling of Paris, Berlin and Milan and winner of the Toti dal Monte competition in Treviso . . . will perform the difficult role of the infamous gypsy girl, with the role of Don Jose to be sung by the experienced Justin Lavender, who was encouraged into a career as a tenor by Peter Pears and Benjamin Britten. With Marc Boucher as Escamillo and Rebecca Ryan as Michaela, the cast is strong and, coupled with Stewart Collins' intriguing narration, the evening should be a most enjoyable one. Of course, the joy of not having to strain your neck to read surtitles cannot be underestimated either.

ON the RTE Performing Groups front, the RTE Vanbrugh Quartet is celebrating its 21st RTE anniversary this year and the occasion is to be marked by a series of tours in the coming months. Bringing together the worlds of the Op 18 No 4 of Beethoven, Shostakovich's 3rd quartet and Schubert's Death and the Maiden quartet, Ireland's leading string quartet will make its first stop of the upcoming tour in the Aula Maxima of University College Cork on 4 October at 8pm, followed by Muckross House, Killarney (5), King House, Boyle (6) and the National Gallery of Ireland (7 October at 3.25pm).