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Opera North commissions sound journeys for lockdown from Walking Home quintet

South African cellist and composer Abel Selaocoe: Responding to beneficial effects of walking. Picture: Mlungisi Mlungwana

OPERA North is creating Walking Home: Sound Journeys For Lockdown in response to the easing of Covid-19 regulations on exercise and time spent outdoors.

For this commission for BBC Arts and Arts Council England’s Culture in Quarantine programme, the Leeds company has asked five artists to write and record new works specifically to be heard while walking.

Crossing folk, jazz, Middle Eastern and African traditions, classical and contemporary music, with a propensity for experimentation and breaking the confines of genre, the contributors are South African cellist and composer Abel Selaocoe; Syrian-born qanun virtuoso Maya Youssef; Syrian-born Iraqi oud player and composer Khyam Allami; Anglo-Polish vocalist, violinist and songwriter Alice Zawadski and English accordionist and electronic experimentalist Martin Green, from the cutting-edge folk trio Lau.

Martin Green: Has a dawn or early morning walk in mind for his piece. Picture: Genevieve Stevenson

Building on Opera North’s history of innovative sound walks and installations, the five musicians are writing and recording their pieces in home studios across Britain and Europe. Once complete, Walking Home will be available through broadcast slots across BBC radio and television, through podcasts on BBC Sounds, and via the BBC Arts website, continuing the Culture in Quarantine mission to bring the arts to homes despite arts venue closures, social distancing and UK-wide lockdowns.

One of 25 new commissions for Culture in Quarantine,Walking Home is billed as a “vibrant cross-section of music-making in Britain today, made by musicians under lockdown for audiences in the same predicament”.

The series seeks to engage with the lockdown context for walking and solitary activity, each 15-minute piece “offering an opportunity to renew our imaginative connections with our environment”.

Maya Youssef: Intense and thoughtful music on the qanun

Jo Nockels, Opera North’s head of projects, says: “The spark for the Walking Home commissions came from the strange alchemy we found between walker, place and music that was powerfully evident in the past sound journey commissions we have made for the Humber Bridge and River Tyne.

“While these five new walking commissions are on a much more intimate scale, and meant for wherever you are, all five respond to the dynamic of walking, listening through headphones and taking in your surroundings to produce an experience as much created by the listener as by the artists. 

“They might offer a soundtrack to a daily escape from lockdown; intensify the sensations experienced on their chosen route; or conjure up something altogether harder to define.”

Iraqi oud player and composer Khyam Allami: Taking cinematic approach to disconcerting atmosphere of urban areas under lockdown

Nockels adds: “We are delighted to be working with five such brilliant and varied composer/musicians on this project, each of whom innovates way beyond the boundaries of genre. Together they will form a collection of music that is refreshing, unexpected and individual.”

Best known as one third of the visionary folk trio Lau, Martin Green’s reputation as a composer in his own right was cemented by an Ivor Award for his Opera North commission for the Great Exhibition of the North in 2018.

Evolving over the course of a half-hour walk along the banks of the River Tyne, Aeons was an epic sound work that featured the Orchestra and Chorus of Opera North and Becky Unthank of The Unthanks. His contribution to the Walking Home series has a dawn or early morning walk in mind.

Alice Zawadski: Classical violin, gospel, jazz and folk. Picture: Monika S Jakubowska

Syrian-born Iraqi oud player Khyam Allami’s haunting installation Requiem For The 21st Century was an Opera North commission for the 2019 PRS New Music Biennale, combining microtonal tuning, ancient Arabic musical modes and generative software to produce ever-changing melodic sequences from speakers fitted within an array of decaying ouds.

Allami will be writing and recording his sound walk from his base in Berlin, taking a cinematic approach to the disconcerting atmosphere of urban areas under lockdown.

Now based in Manchester, cellist and composer Abel Selaocoe moves seamlessly from collaborations with world musicians and beatboxers to concerto performances and solo classical recitals.

He spent an Opera North Resonance residency working on a new body of solo music for the cello influenced by traditional African instruments. His sound journey will acknowledge the beneficial effects that he has felt from walking over the past weeks.

Walking Home: Five artists are writing and recording new works specifically to be heard while walking

Born and raised in Damascus, Maya Youssef plays the qanun, the Arabic form of the zither with a history dating back to the 19th century BC. She has made her home in the UK after recognition from the Government’s Exceptional Talent programme for her intense and thoughtful music, rooted in the Arabic classical tradition but taking inspiration from Western classical music and jazz. 

Drawing on classical violin, gospel, jazz and folk, Alice Zawadzki’s output as soloist and collaborator is prodigious and eclectic. Her second solo album, last year’s Within You Is A World Of Spring, showcased her mastery of a range of styles in an inspired collection of songs.

Opera North is “still in discussion with the BBC about a release date, but hopefully it will be within the next month or so”.

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Opera North and Leeds Playhouse postpone Sondheim’s A Little Night Music

The artwork for the postponed Opera North and Leeds Playhouse co-production of A Little Night Music

OPERA North is cancelling or postponing all “public-facing activity” until at least the end of April, in response to the COVID-19 crisis.

The Leeds company also confirmed the postponement of this season’s co-production of Stephen Sondheim’s acerbic musical A Little Night Music with Leeds Playhouse. Rehearsals had been due to start this morning for the May 9 opening to mark the year when the New York composer turned 90 yesterday.

“Our immediate priority is the health and safety of our audiences, artists and staff, and we hope to be able to mount the production in a future season,” said Opera North general director Richard Mantle.

Stephen Sondheim: composer of the 1973 musical A Little Night Musical

“This is undoubtedly a time of great challenge for Opera North and our peers but we are determined to respond with creativity and resilience.

“We will honour the contracts of all guest artists to the end of our current main stage opera season and those of guest orchestral players until the end of April.”

Mr Mantle continued: “We are working with our many education and community partners to ascertain what work can still be delivered in those settings, and will focus our creativity and core resources on finding new ways of using music and opera to enhance people’s lives. In these uncertain times, it feels more important than ever that we use music to connect with each other.”

A close-up of the Orchestra of Opera North. Picture: Justin Slee

Opera North remains hopeful that the 2020-2021 season will go ahead as planned in September. In the meantime, the company is working on finding other ways to share its art form with audiences, including online resources. 

Opera North’s livestream of The Turn Of The Screw is available via OperaVision at 
operavision.eu/en/library/performances/operas/turn-screw-opera-north; the full Opera North Ring Cycle at operanorth.co.uk/the-ring-cycle/; the 2017 production of Trouble In Tahiti via Now TV and Sky on-demand services.

For updated information on Opera North event cancellations and postponements, visit  operanorth.co.uk/news/coronavirus-covid-19-update/.

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REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on Opera North’s hellish The Turn Of The Screw

A scene from Opera North’s The Turn Of The Screw. Picture: Tristram Kenton

REVIEW: Opera North in The Turn Of The Screw, Leeds Grand Theatre, February 18. Further performances on February 21, 25 and 27, then touring until March 19. Box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com

PART of the fascination of any ghost story – and Henry James certainly intended The Turn Of The Screw to be one – is its dabbling with a world that we can never fully comprehend or understand.

We are frightened, as James was himself, by his own creation, by the horrors that our imaginations are led to conjure. The sky – or hell – is the limit.

Myfanwy Piper’s libretto retains most of James’s ambiguities, while Britten’s music wonderfully clarifies their existence but offers no definitive answers to the questions they pose.

We know of Britten’s own obsession with the corruption of innocence. We also have plenty of recent examples of the terrors that may befall children put into care, like Miles and Flora here. The question for a director of the opera is how unambiguous to be.

Alessandro Talevi’s production was certainly probing when it first appeared in the autumn of 2010. This time round, he opens up new possibilities: he hardly misses an opportunity to interpret and he has schooled all six of his cast into finely honed acting, without exception.

In Sarah Tynan’s Governess we have a minutely judged, sexually repressed ingénue: she is as surprised as we are by a lonely Mrs Grose’s fondling attentions. She is equally puzzled by Miles’s come-hither kiss, delivered just before he climbs into her bed: this boy may be in thrall to Quint, but is also prey to rampaging hormones.

So, which of these signals leads up an emotional cul-de-sac? Or are they merely figments of the governess’s fevered imagination? The fact that such questions need to be asked at all is a sure indication that Talevi knows exactly how to provoke.

He also views the tale from the children’s point of view. At one point, we are shown a Narnia-style, fairy-tale landscape – easily taken for a Victorian orangery stocked with exotic flowers – in which younger versions of Miles and Flora can be seen frolicking.

In Madeleine Boyd’s majestic set, Bly is a Victorian pile in need of more than a spring clean, with Quint glimpsed in the tower behind its tall, murky windows. The building itself is part of the oppression all its inmates feel, doubtless compelling them into aberration.

Her costumes are regulation late Victorian, shading into Edwardian, but her hair-styles are notable: the Pre-Raphaelite cast of Miss Jessel’s Titian tresses, Quint’s bright orange thatch and side-burns, Flora’s Alice-curls, all contrast firmly with the governess’s prim blonde bun.

The props are carefully selected too: a manic rocking-horse, a giant four-poster, from whose roof Flora dangles her puppets, a school desk, and a large horn above a turntable, on which Miles “plays” parody Mozart; all bask in Matthew Haskins’ shadow-laden lighting.

After an exceptionally clear prologue, Nicholas Watts fashions a menacing Quint, likely to cause many a nightmare, while Eleanor Dennis’s pregnant Miss Jessel finds an unearthly tone equally guaranteed to spook. Heather Shipp’s seemingly phlegmatic Mrs Grose flashes into emotion more than once. 

Tynan’s keenly-observed governess is a study in bafflement as she steadily loses her marbles to guilt and self-reproach. Jennifer Clark’s lively, mischievous Flora suggests someone much younger than she looked, while Tim Gasiorek’s well-tuned, light-voiced Miles acts his socks off.

All have reason to be grateful for the exceptional clarity with which Leo McFall’s orchestra paints their various motifs; one could hardly imagine their playing being more finely nuanced. Talevi’s revival may raise more questions than it answers, but it unquestionably held this audience in rapt appreciation.

Review by Martin Dreyer

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REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on Opera North’s revival of The Marriage Of Figaro

Fflur Wyn as Susanna and Phillip Rhodes as Figaro in Opera North’s The Marriage Of Figaro. All pictures:. Robert Workman

Opera North in The Marriage Of Figaro, Leeds Grand Theatre, February 1 ****

Further Leeds performances on February 8, 14, 19, 22, 26 and 29, then on tour . More details at operanorth.co.uk. Leeds box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com

IT is strange how operatic revivals can vary so much from their originals, even when the same director is on hand to oversee them. Jo Davies’s production of Mozart’s opera buffa dates from January 2015. That is before the Me Too movement really took off in October 2017, when the treatment of women in Hollywood began to come under the microscope.

 Its repercussions on this show are fascinating. The two leading men, Count Almaviva and Figaro himself, are by far the most charismatic here. That is partly down to the singers involved. But it also reflects the relative hardness of their ladies, the Countess and Susanna.

These men are having their very manhood challenged, even as they attempt their various conquests. It could help to explain why Quirijn de Lang’s relentlessly dim-witted Count (though the singer himself is clearly quite the opposite) comes across as a failed Don Giovanni, never quite achieving those desired notches on his cane. The man is libidinous beyond belief. Even at the end you wonder how long he can possibly remain faithful to his wife. He nevertheless sings with plenty of self-belief.

Heather Lowe as Cherubino

The New Zealand baritone Phillip Rhodes relaxes into the title role immediately, despite taking it on for the first time. The part could have been made for him. His Figaro retains unclouded optimism in the face of every setback, helped by warm, clear tone and a pair of eyebrows that crinkle with mirth at every excuse.

Opposite him, Fflur Wyn, also new to her role as Susanna, is a calculating creature – the gardener Antonio’s social-climbing niece – rather than a playful minx. Her soprano is light and clean, her diction less so. Nor is clarity Máire Flavin’s strong point as the Countess. Her first aria was too tense to excite sympathy, her second showed what might have been, with fluent control. But she moves beautifully and always has the moral high ground over her wayward husband.

The lower orders are well represented. It comes as no surprise to discover that Heather Lowe, the tousle-haired Cherubino, is a trained dancer. She is exceptionally nimble as well as vocally adept, not least as girl-plays-boy-playing girl.

Jonathan Best makes a diffident old fogey of Bartolo, well partnered by Gaynor Keeble’s earthy Marcellina. Joseph Shovelton is back with his oily Basilio, as is Jeremy Peaker’s rubicund Antonio. Alexandra Oomens is the peppy Barbarina. Even Warren Gillespie’s Curzio makes a mark, here as a censer-swinging priest. Real incense too.

Quirijn de Lang as Count Almaviva and Máire Flavin as Countess Almaviva

 Antony Hermus makes his first appearance in the pit since being appointed Principal Guest Conductor. He is a mixed blessing. His rigid, hyperactive baton ensures taut ensemble, but allows his woodwinds little flexibility; the strength of his accents regularly swamps the singers’ words in ensemble. On the other hand, conducting from the harpsichord, his recitatives flow idiomatically.

 Leslie Travers’s mobile set shows both the downstairs and the upstairs of this society, the former doubling as the outside of the house for the garden scene. Peeling wallpaper and rickety staircases speak of genteel poverty. Gabrielle Dalton’s socially-layered costumes could be from almost any era.

In the wake of Me Too, we should expect certain aspects of the comedy to be soft-pedalled. But there is plenty of amusement at the expense of the men. And that is as it should be. 

Phillip Rhodes as Figaro

Review by Martin Dreyer

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How the Music Works for Opera North as new redevelopment is named the Howard Opera Centre

Architect’s visualisation of the redeveloped Opera North estate, showing the Howard Assembly Room, new restaurant, box office and atrium on the left and the Howard Opera Centre on the right.

OPERA North’s redeveloped headquarters in Leeds will bear the name of philanthropist Dr Keith Howard OBE.

The Howard Opera Centre will take on this title in recognition of the Yorkshire benefactor’s personal gift of £11.25 million towards the opera company’s redevelopment project, Music Works.

It is thought to be among the largest private donations ever made to a British arts company outside of London.

Dr Howard, a lifelong opera lover and cricket fan, is the founder of Emerald Group Publishing and president of Opera North.

The Howard Opera Centre will house Opera North’s rehearsal studios, costume and wigs workshop and administrative offices.

The redevelopment work on New Briggate and Harrison Street will create a world-class facility to make opera; a new education studio and additional rehearsal spaces, including a new rehearsal room for Opera North’s orchestra and chorus and a suite of music coaching rooms.

The Howard Opera Centre will join another space named ten years earlier in recognition of Dr Howard’s support for the company, the Howard Assembly Room, a 300-seat performance venue offering a diverse calendar of jazz, world music, folk, classical concerts, children’s opera, talks, film and installations.

Originally opened in 2009 after extensive restoration, the Howard Assembly Room is closed during the Music Works redevelopment project. It will reopen in 2021 with a new dedicated and fully accessible entrance and atrium, an increased number of performances and a new restaurant and bar, replacing a row of previously vacant shop units on New Briggate.

The redevelopment project began on site last summer and is being delivered by Henry Boot Construction, a Sheffield regional construction contractor with a commitment to reducing environment impacts.

The overall target for the Music Works fundraising campaign is £18 million.  Opera North has raised £15.6 million to date, including the £11.25 million gift that combines £9 million with £2.25 million in Gift Aid.  Leeds City Council has contributed £750,000, together with the lease of the vacant shops on New Briggate, and funding of £499,999 has been awarded by Arts Council England.

The balance of the funds raised so far has come from private donors, trusts and supporters, including a £1 million donation from the Liz and Terry Bramall Foundation, as well as a significant contribution from Mrs Maureen Pettman and major gifts from private individuals.

Councillor Jonathan Pryor, from Leeds City Council, left, Dr Keith Howard, and Opera North’s general director, Richard Mantle, attending the <Leeds company’s 2019/20 season launch at Harewood House. Picture: Justin Slee

In addition, gifts have been pledged by the Wolfson Foundation, Backstage Trust, the Kirby Laing Foundation, the Foyle Foundation and the Garfield Weston Foundation.

Although 87 per cent of the target has been raised, there remains a funding gap of £2.4 million to close. Opera North is  looking to patrons, Friends and audiences to play their part in the success of the redevelopment at many different levels. Work also continues to attract funding from further charitable trusts and foundations and the business community in Leeds.

Richard Mantle, Opera North’s general director, said: ““Opera North is delighted to be able to recognise the extraordinary generosity of our longstanding supporter and friend, Dr Keith Howard, whose contribution to this project means that we are able to create a new artistic home for the company, as well as improving the infrastructure, access and visitor experience for the Howard Assembly Room.

“The Howard Opera Centre will be a true centre of excellence, bringing together rehearsal spaces for world-class opera productions with coaching rooms, where singers can develop their vocal expertise, and specialist costume workshop spaces.

“A new hub for our education work will create an inclusive space for our work with young people from across the city, bringing children and young people right to the heart of our creative community.”

Councillor Judith Blake, leader of Leeds City Council, said: “We are pleased to see this significant redevelopment now taking shape, creating a vastly improved artistic and educational hub for one of Leeds’s leading cultural assets.

“Opera North makes a huge contribution to the city, both in terms of the vitality and diversity of work seen on stage, and also through its work with children, young people and communities throughout our region.

“Through the revitalisation of a neglected section of New Briggate, the improved facilities for the Howard Assembly Room will work in tandem with our wider aspirations for the area as part of the Heritage Action Zones and Connecting Leeds programmes, creating a vibrant destination and supporting our plans for a better-connected city.” 

Opera North employs more than 250 people, such as costume makers, stage managers, electricians, stage technicians, props makers, sound and lighting technicians, educators, designers and musicians, in addition to working with around 370 freelance performers, creatives and artists each year.

Opera North’s opera productions are created and premiered in Leeds, where the company performs at Leeds Grand Theatre each season before touring its opera productions to theatres across the country.

The Music Works redevelopment is scheduled to be completed in phases, with the Howard Opera Centre opening in late 2020, and the Howard Assembly Room, restaurant and atrium scheduled for completion in 2021.

Watch a short film about Music Works at https://youtu.be/4xQU4q0xFD4

Work to replace the vacant shop units on New Briggate, Leeds, with a new restaurant and bar, December 2019. Picture: Tom Arber

MUSIC WORKS

“More live music, for everyone”.

 More performances in the Howard Assembly Room every year;

 A dedicated entrance for the Howard Assembly Room;

 An open, welcoming building that is fully accessible at all levels;

 New public spaces and an atrium.

Music Works will enable Opera North to host a full year-round programme of performances, workshops and small-scale productions in the Howard Assembly Room, increasing the number of performances given at the venue.

The best global musicians and artists will be brought to Leeds each year, creating a

diverse calendar of jazz, world music, folk, classical concerts, children’s opera, talks, film and installations.

 A new restaurant and bar, open to everyone all day;

 A refurbished Opera North box office and reception for Leeds Grand Theatre

 Restoration of a Grade II listed building

A crane moves steel on to the construction site at the top of the new Howard Opera Centre, looking east towards the Quarry House government offices, January 2020. Picture: Tom Arber

Music Works will regenerate a row of vacant shops directly beneath the Howard Assembly Room to

create a new restaurant and bar alongside a refurbished box office. A new dedicated “front door” will be established for Opera North and the Howard Assembly Room; the building will be open to everyone from morning until late at night for coffee, lunch, dinner and drinks.

Cutting-edge facilities for making opera: The Howard Opera Centre:

 A new purpose-built Music Rehearsal Studio;

 Three new music practice rooms;

 Refurbished Costume Workshop and Dye Room;

 A new artist and Company green room.

A home for Opera North Education:

 A new, flexible Education Studio;

 A new music coaching room for students;

 Break-out spaces and “secret garden” for school groups;

 A shared entrance for students, artists and staff, placing young people at the heart of the company.

An environmentally sustainable cultural flagship for Leeds:

 An environmentally sustainable and efficient estate;

 Photovoltaic panels to generate energy;

 A significant contribution to the New Briggate public realm;

 A major capital investment in the run up to 2023 Leeds cultural celebrations;

 Investment in digital infrastructure to increase efficiency and reduce environmental impact.

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REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on Opera North’s Street Scene, Leeds Grand Theatre, 18/1/2020

Gillene Butterfield as Rose Maurrant and Alex Banfield as Sam Kaplan in Opera North’s Street Scene. All pictures: Clive Barda

Opera North in Street Scene; Leeds Grand Theatre. Box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com

KURT Weill’s “American opera” is actually a hotchpotch of styles from both sides of the pond. Opera, both serious and light, musicals, jazz, and dance all jostle in song, speech and melodrama to reflect a cosmopolitan tenement in Manhattan.

It is also an ensemble piece, with a multiplicity of small roles that offer an ideal opportunity to showcase in depth the talents of Opera North’s chorus. It requires a director with wide-reaching experience, prepared for painstaking attention to detail. Though set in stifling heat, Matthew Eberhardt’s production is so far only luke-warm; it may yet come to the boil.

Francis O’Connor’s network of metal stairs and walkways in the midst of a beehive of apartments augments the bustle of life, allowing just enough space for dance. There is only a single exit from this ghetto on ground level, compounding the claustrophobia. So far, so good.

Giselle Allen as Anna Maurrant in Street Scene

His costumes are more debatable. Most of the cast are wearing far too much for the alleged heat – T-shirts, anyone? – nor is it likely that pantsuits would have been common currency in a down-at-heel 1940s neighbourhood.

There are two main story-lines to Elmer Price’s book, which is based on his 1929 play of the same name: the adultery and eventual death of Anna Maurrant, and the ultimately doomed, cross-faith puppy love between her daughter Rose and studious Sam Kaplan. Everything else is atmosphere.

Eberhardt does little to elucidate Anna’s dalliances with the milkman – admittedly Weill is not much help here – so that when her husband shoots them both, we are left relatively unmoved. Similarly, so little electricity illuminates the friendship between Rose and Sam that it seems bound to remain platonic from the word go.

Claire Pascoe as Emma Jones, Byron Jackson as Henry Davis, Amy J Payne as Olga Olsen, Richard Mosley-Evans as George Jones, Miranda Bevin as Greta Fiorentino, John Savournin as Carl Olsen, Christopher Turner as Lippo Fiorentino and Robert Hayward as Frank Maurrant, with children in Opera North’s Street Scene

The evening has plenty of compensations, however. There are several self-contained numbers that show Weill at his best. The Ice-Cream Sextet joyously led by Italian airman Lippo (Christopher Turner); a song-and-dance jitterbug by Rodney Vubya and Michelle Andrews; the raucous children’s game to open Act 2, superbly danced (choreography by Gary Clarke); the trenchant wit of the Nursemaids’ Lullaby (Lorna James and Hazel Croft, pushing prams) – all these are beacons of humour and entertainment.

The orchestra under James Holmes is especially alive to jazz styles and the rhythm section has a field-day. Act 2 has its longueurs after the children’s game and some of his tempos here are on the sluggish side. But colour anyway seems temporarily to drain out of the action, as if Eberhardt’s inspiration is flagging.

Giselle Allan as Anna makes the most of the work’s biggest aria, Somehow I Could Never Believe, a vivid picture of marital frustration. Less three-dimensional is Robert Hayward as her abusive husband Frank, who rarely takes leave of drink and anger, though forceful enough in Let Things Be Like They Always Was.

Michelle Andrews as Mae Jones and Rodney Vubya as Dick McGann in Street Scene

Gillene Butterfield is an engaging Rose, ploughing a difficult furrow between distance and engagement with Sam, and fending off the unwanted attentions of her Lothario boss (Quirijn de Lang). Sam is persuasively drawn by Alex Banfield: we feel his pangs for Rose in We’ll Go Away Together.

Among any number of good cameos, two stand out: Claire Pascoe’s Bronx-accented Mrs Jones, the ghetto gossip, and Byron Jackson as the janitor. Both are vivid and distinctive. American accents come and go, mirroring the way the action fades in and out of focus. There is much potential here. Things may well settle down as the run progresses. 

Further performances on January 25, February 12, 20 and 28, then on tour.

Review by Martin Dreyer