As Paul Fryer has already reported, this was a superb concert performance.
Here are a few more details.

Grigoris           Clive Bayley
The patriarcheas/old man
                   Paul Hudson
Ladas/Kostandis    Jozik Koc
Michelis           Richard Coxon
Yannakos           Timothy Robinson
Manolios           David Rendall
Nikolios/Despinio  Sandra Ford
Andonis/Panais     Alasdair Elliot
Katerina           Susan Chilcott
Lenio              Alwyn Mellor
Old woman          Nuala Willis
Fotis              Mark Beesley

Conductor          Jiri Belohlavek

BBC Symphony Orchestra
BBC Symphony Chorus
Finchley Children's Music Group

To be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 at 7.30pm on Monday 19Jan98

Based on the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis, The Greek passion was completed
eight month's before, and first performed a few days before, Martinu's
death in 1958. It seems to be regarded as his great Czech opera, in spite
of its Greek Asia Minor setting, because of the central role that the
village and eastern Christian liturgy play. The music makes some use of
Greek folk music, but more of Orthodox liturgical themes -- except where
these are prominent, it didn't strike me as particularly Greek, more as
generic central European/Balkan.

The events of the story are set in the years immediately after the first
world war, The priest Grigoris assigns roles in the next year's Easter
passion play to people who then variously fulfill them in real life.
Manolis, the shepherd, is cast as Christ and as he seeks to live like him
incurs the hostility of the priest and village elders, and is eventually
murdered.

The trigger for the tragedy is the arrival of a group of refugees whose
village has been destroyed during the ethnic cleansing that accompanied the
disintegration of the Ottoman empire in the years after the war. Yannakos,
cast as Peter, and Katerina, Mary Magdalene, perform acts of kindness to
them, while the priest tries to drive them away. Manolis helps them find a
place to settle and comes into direct conflict with the priest. (There's a
bitterly comic moment when the priest says something to the effect of
"What's he doing talking about Christ? He's evil -- I'm the only person
who's allowed to talk about Christ".)

A recurring idea is the transformation of ordinary attitudes into humane
and spiritual ones: Yannakos, initially persuaded to multiply his profits
by fleecing the refugees, reflects on the parable of the sower and chooses
to grow in loving kindness instead. And the refugees' pleas for help are
also the liturgical Kyrie eleison.

The story was clearly resonant for Martinu and his audience in the years
after the second world war, when Europe was again flooded with refugees.
His adaptation of the novel, however, removes the Turkish Aga, who is the
real power corresponding to the Romans in the gospels. This loses the
analogy of the soviet empire, but it makes the elders and particularly the
priest Grigoris into the sole villains and keeps the action focussed within
the village. Today, it is easy also to think of Bosnia, where local feuds
have erupted in the power vacuum left by the disintegration of Yugoslavia.

Martinu's setting is on the scale demanded by both the political context
and the scriptural model of the story. There is a double chorus, as in the
St Matthew Passion, and a massive orchestra that overflowed the stage of
the Barbican Hall. But the drama takes place on a personal level, evolving
in scenes of conflict or sympathy between two or three people. The choruses
also form well-defined characters.

This was a straight concert performance, but the superb dramatic
organization of the work, as well as the acting of the singers, meant that
it was always perfectly clear and very effective. The orchestra and all the
singers were excellent.

Clive Bayley was pompous and nasty as Gregoris, while Mark Beesley sounded
splendidly Slavic as Fotis, the refugees' priest. Timothy Robinson was
solid and quite humorous as Yannakos, whose goodness emerges from simple
sympathy, in contrast to Manolis' more sophisticated reflections. His
repeated lines at the end of the second and third acts were very powerful
indeed.

Susan Chilcott sounded a tad, well, pure, as Katerina, though she sang very
movingly. David Rendall had the presence and substance to make Manolis'
comparatively small amount of music central to the drama.

Paul Fryer is absolutely right, of course. The Greek passion needs to be
staged. It's a beautiful piece of theatre that deals with important ideas
in a clear, accessible and humane way.