Berliner Zeitung, 18th September 2002
… The production of Der Glockenturm by the Sopiensaele and the production team NOVOFLOT captivates with its musical quality, through the engaged work of the orchestra conducted by Vicente Larrañaga as much as through the good singers. Rupert Bergmann as Bannadonna, Melih Tepretmez as Giovanni and Julia Henning as Una really make something of their parts, and sing with great understanding of the text. Especially Henning has a magical presence, and moulds her lines with such command as if she were singing Verdi. The most notable idea in Sven Holm’s direction consists of clarifying the abstract, philosophical level of the subject in a series of diagrams which the actor Giovanni shows sheet by sheet to the public: technical catastrophes, the casting of the bell – all this is presented in elegant abstract images. Also the program contains a flip book animation of a rocket taking-off and exploding, perhaps recalling the 1986 Challenger disaster. … Whoever is interested in the music theatre of the twentieth century shouldn’t miss this production.
… The production of Der Glockenturm by the Sopiensaele and the production team NOVOFLOT captivates with its musical quality, through the engaged work of the orchestra conducted by Vicente Larrañaga as much as through the good singers. Rupert Bergmann as Bannadonna, Melih Tepretmez as Giovanni and Julia Henning as Una really make something of their parts, and sing with great understanding of the text. Especially Henning has a magical presence, and moulds her lines with such command as if she were singing Verdi. The most notable idea in Sven Holm’s direction consists of clarifying the abstract, philosophical level of the subject in a series of diagrams which the actor Giovanni shows sheet by sheet to the public: technical catastrophes, the casting of the bell – all this is presented in elegant abstract images. Also the program contains a flip book animation of a rocket taking-off and exploding, perhaps recalling the 1986 Challenger disaster. … Whoever is interested in the music theatre of the twentieth century shouldn’t miss this production.
DeutschlandRadio Berlin, 16th September 2002
… Director Sven Holm is less concerned with the ostensible narration of a failing artist than with a further level of interpretation. After the worker Giovanni is killed by the bell-caster right at the beginning of the opera, he stands at the edge of the action showing A3 pictograms with small explanatory pictures, the senators writhe in spasms, and also the troubled love story between the beautiful Una and the mad Bannadonna doesn’t end well. Rupert Bergman sings the bell-caster with great commitment, though he falls a little short of the role, which might be due to his short-noticed leap into this murderous part. Julia Henning is the powerful-voiced Una. …Under the leadership of Vicente Larrañaga, Novoflot have rounded up a very competent orchestra and also found surprisingly good singers. … After the pleasant and productive collaboration [Novoflot] are now concentrating on new projects. They intend to keep their individual approach.
Opera Now London, January 2003
… I found the score absolutely fascinating. It was also astonishingly well played by an opera group called NOVOFLOT, conducted by Vicente Larrañaga. … – the thing sounded amazingly rich and was always engrossing. The production, in a dilapidated cavern of the Sophiensæle in East Berlin was anything but rich. It was a dark, grim, minimalist business that seemed to make no serious contact with the wide-ranging claims Krenek scholars have made for the opera's significance. Even the determination of the producer, Sven Holm, to link the main character's obsessions with modern technological triumphalism remained largely obscure. A cast of young singers was severely tested. None came through better than the soprano Julia Henning (Una). …
Orpheus International, January 2003
… The independent opera group NOVOFLOT have shown support for a contemporary of Blacher – the Austrian Ernst Krenek, whose chamber opera, Der Glockenturm, first shown in America in 1957, has experienced its Berlin premier in the Sophiensaele. An artist, the bell-caster, will stop at nothing to complete his work despite the resistance of his employers. Krenek also develops a dark image of society, an image, which in Sven Holm’s puzzling staging certainly doesn’t achieve any clarity. Musically the performance is a success, since Vicente Larrañaga draws out the music alternating between twelve-tone and atmospherical passages with remarkable discipline and command, and with Julia Henning and Rupert Bergman has superb lead performers. …