Alan Cooper reviews: Encouraging New Opera
Scottish Opera, Aberdeen University & sound festival
MARISCHAL CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
CHRISTOPHER GRAY: Conductor
LUCY HOLE: Soprano
JOSH BAXTER: Tenor
MATTHEW OLIVER: Baritone
MORVEN LIND: Mezzo
MATTHEW RICHARDSON: Director
JOHNSTON HALL, ABERDEEN UNIVERSITY
Sunday, 02 November 2014
Joe Stollery & James Leonard: Nature’s House
Mark McNamee & Ruth Potts: Solace
Any opera project requires a huge input of talent, effort and of course money so I should begin by mentioning The Leverhulme Trust without whose generous help today’s fantastic performances could not have happened. Some years ago Scottish Opera staged performances of five short operas where in each case they invited pairs of artists, a librettist and a composer, to create a short work which was then performed by Scottish Opera orchestra and singers. The artists involved were all well established adults. Today’s event is probably more important in that the artists were all young students who may well be inspired to create further works in the genre. For the adults it was possibly more of a one off experience.
Encouraging New Opera is a collaborative project created by Scottish Opera and the University of Aberdeen Music Department. The three year project began in May 2013. Two teams of undergraduate students took part in workshops under the expert guidance of Gareth Williams (Scottish Opera Composer in Residence) and Matthew Richardson (Director) and today’s Operas were the first fruits of the collaboration.
Designer Tricia Kenny was responsible for the staging and costumes of the two operas. The antique desk, globe of the world drinks cabinet and ancient wheelchair created a splendid atmosphere even before the work started – a great example of how just a few well-chosen items can create the impression on stage of a whole world. The librettist for the first opera, Nature’s House was by James Leonard and the music score was the work of Joe Stollery. In this first opera I was particularly impressed by Joe Stollery’s orchestral scoring. Its colours instantly created a powerful atmosphere and changes of mood and characterisation were multiple and instantly recognisable matching James Leonard’s libretto splendidly. Stollery’s writing for strings, woodwind and his refined use of percussion including piano and celeste really brought the performance to life. I was always anxious to know what was going to happen next and the music was an important part of that. The scoring was tonal and I am pleased to hear young composers, and some less young ones too finding new ways of deploying this musical language. The vocal parts always had fresh and unexpected turns to them. There was great singing too from the principals. Joshua Baxter an Aberdeen graduate now studying at the Royal Academy of Music in London was always good but his voice has matured both in strength and beauty. It was interesting that in both operas the tenor was “the baddie”. Soprano Lucy Hole was splendid both in her singing and acting and there was a great character performance from baritone Matthew Oliver. The story of the opera was right up to date with its theme of conservation versus industry and Charles (the baddie) lost out in spite of his alpha male attempts to dominate the action.
The second work had Ruth Potts as librettist and Mark McNamee as composer. There were some nice touches of comedy at the beginning of the piece in which the music matched the dialogue very nicely. The piece soon turned to the dark side though and we should have guessed that from the appearance of Matthew Oliver as the Hotel Manager – straight out of Hammer Horror he was! Josh Baxter again a baddie – at least at the beginning of the work had a less highlighted part in this opera. The core of the work centred round the vocal duos between Lucy Hole as Ailsa, the bride to be and Morven Lind as the ghost of Helen Lund who had committed suicide from the window of the bridal suite in the hotel. There was gorgeous vocal writing backed by strings from composer Mark McNamee and fabulous text from Ruth Potts. As well as being a writer, Ruth is a multitalented musician – is she Aberdeen University’s Stephen Sondheim? I liked the rather spooky spoken choruses from members of the orchestra too. At the end, after Ailsa had been enticed to her death in the sea by the ghost of Helen Gunn and a bereft Duncan played by Josh Baxter had been led away by the Hotel Manager a new couple played by Peter Relph and Isobel Epstein were led into the bridal suite by the Hotel Manager – another nice Hammer Horror touch.
The creation of the librettists and composers were top notch as were the performances of the singers and the marvellous orchestra. If the students from my time, the mid nineteen sixties, had been whisked forward in time to witness these performances we simply would not have believed it possible – so three cheers for Aberdeen University Music and Scottish Opera!
© Alan Cooper
