Posts Tagged ‘Studio 3’
CLICK HERE to view a full festival schedule
Against Oblivion, Part 2 – Regular Music II – Thurs 30 & Fri 31 July 7pm
Director/Music: Jeremy Peyton Jones.
Words: David Gale.
What do we think when we look back on our lives? What is the mark we have left? Why are some obsessed with fame and celebrity? Are our lives empty or full? Three singers from very different vocal traditions (church choral, soul/gospel and contemporary) consider their own life stories and try to make sense of their legacies. An extraordinary theatrical sound collage follows.
Devised in collaboration with the performers David Knight, Melanie Pappenheim and Brenda Rattray, pianist Yeu-Meng Chan, electric guitarist Steve Smith and rock/improvising drummer Charles Hayward whose high-energy experimental drumming with electronics provides an “intoxicating mix of percussive attack, swirling electronics and lyrical fragment collage.” Along with sound designer Jeremy Cox, all bring their own contribution to the eclectic mix
The Weather Man – Opera North – Thurs 30 & Fri 31 July 8.30pm
Music: Paul Clark.
Words: John Binias. Narrator: Sarah Belcher. FitzRoy: Robert Poulton.
The friendship between Robert FitzRoy and Charles Darwin blossomed during the five years together on the Beagle. But as Darwin developed his theory of natural selection, FitzRoy became an ardent creationist and the two friends were divided by the 19th Century’s greatest intellectual faultline.This fascinating production of John Binias and Paul Clark’s chamber work for string quartet, baritone and spoken voice explores what happened when the two friends found themselves on the opposite sides of history.
Flights into Darkness – Sounds Underground – Thurs 30 & Fri 31 July 10pm
Music: Robert Fokkens. 
Words: Oscar Wilde & Arthur Schnitzler
Featuring: Tom Frankland (actor) and Jakob Fichert (piano)
“What would you say if I told you I had murdered?”
A thrilling journey of one man’s descent into madness. But will you be complicit as his confession unfolds and his sanity disintegrates? This moving story told in music, words and drama brings together text from ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’, with episodes from Arthur Schnitzler’s ‘Flight into Darkness’. Look forward to a deeply disturbing yet compelling theatrical encounter.
“Highly original…It is impossible not to be completely enthralled…” Daily Info, Oxford
The Song of Margery Kempe – Brian Inglis – Sat 1 8.30pm & Sun 2 Aug 5.30pm
Music and Words: Brian Inglis
Featuring: Loré Lixenberg
Designs by Paul Burgess
Where Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads meets The Exorcist; surely an experience not to be missed. Margery is a woman on the edge. Her business has failed, she is estranged from her husband and to top it all she is tormented by voices threatening to destroy her. Will her faith keep her safe or will she be burnt at the stake? Will this desperate housewife survive? And at what cost? Tête à Tête is delighted to host the finished version of a show presented as a work in progress at our 2008 festival.
http://www.composer.co.uk/composers/inglis.html
Circus Tricks – Tête à Tête – Sat 1 Aug 7pm
Music: Michael Henry. 
Words: Adey Grummet
The knife thrower’s assistant cannot stand the pain of her secret love for the knife-thrower. Barney the horse just dreams of running in straight lines. Alice, the trapeze artist longs for the deadly sensation of falling. 3 brilliantly executed vignettes portary circus performers desperate to bre ak the daily cycle of their act. It will leave you laughing, spellbound and utterly entranced.
The Emergency Recital – Richard Thomas – Sat 1 Aug 10pm
Words and Music: Richard Thomas
Hotfoot from his worldwide mission (Sydney Opera House/Carnegie Hall) to spread operatic joy and pain, Richard Thomas (Jerry Springer The Opera/ BBC Kombat Operas ) is released for one night only from his gimp box to plumb the shallows of his cavernous X-rated song cycle, “1001 Songs About Anything”. Glad to oblige, ready to annoy.
Featuring Richard Thomas on the early consort spinnet; Lore Lixenberg on Howling and Adey Grummet on Wailing. Funny and moving and especially funny if you’re moving.
Far Away and Long Ago -Tête à Tête – Work in Progress – Sun 2 Aug 4pm
Music: Laura Bowler. 
Words: Alasdair Middleton.
Did you enjoy fairy stories as a child? Be careful, this production puts the Grimm into Brothers Grimm with a dark re-telling of some of the classics with no reference to Disney. With classic Tête à Tête theatrical pace enjoy these witty, sassy dark tales of magic and mayhem. Definitely not one for the children!
High Noon to Jacko’s Hour – Opera Engine – Sun 2 Aug 7pm
Music: Elfyn Jones.
Words: Tim Satterthwaite
Jacko’s Hour is a retelling of the classic Western High Noon, set in present-day England. For the Opera Festival, Opera Engine present a multimedia extravaganza, meshing opera and film, music and drama. There’s blood in the dust of a US frontier town, and in the dry mud of a Yorkshire fairground. A righteous man must stand alone!
Gutter Press, The Opera – Rat Pack Productions – Thurs 6 & Fri 7 Aug 7pm
Music: Fergal O’Mahony
Words: James Richards
Featuring: Abi Titmuss
Smile! The paparazzi are in town. Gutter Press – The Opera takes place on the front lines of the oversexed, overexposed and under-fed feeding frenzy of starlets and snappers that make up the Fame Game. Enjoy this edgy satire that bristles with wit and squirms with sleaze. Flash a bit of flesh and leave your scruples at the door….
The Star Beast – Must See (Musical Theatre Company) – Thurs 6 & Fri 7 Aug 8.30pm
Music and Words: Omar Shahryar
Director: Oliver Platt
An injured and distressed creature turns up on a farms’ doorstep. What is it? A monkey? A disfigured man? But when this mere ‘beast’ starts to talk, become the star of the circus, but seems to be unhappy to be just a performing animal, who is going to listen? Huddle round for this intriguing and compelling new work, based on the postmodern fairytale by children’s fantasy writer Nicholas Stuart Gray.
Songs of a Recollected lover – Madestrange Opera – Thurs 6 & Fri 7 Aug 10pm
Music and Words: Michael Oliva. 
Featuring: Rosie Coad
If the wife you lost to suicide 10 years ago returned, formed only of your memories of her – all the evasions, half-truths, denial and lies – what would she say? Be part of the development of a new multimedia opera exploring the frailty of human memory, and relationships, and the impossibility of truly understanding the one you love.
Flam – Flam Productions – Sat 8th Aug 7pm & Sun 9th Aug 4pm
Music: Orlando Gough
Director: Emma Bernard
Performers: Rebecca Askew & Melanie Pappenheim
A huge hit from the 2008 Festival. A woman sits alone in a café. Her friend (her sister? her lover?) appears, late, flustered. They greet each other and sing together. They take off their coats. They are wearing the same clothes. Thereafter, they provoke one another, needle one another, bully one another, support each other and enjoy one another’s company. Clearly they have a shared past.
“quite brilliant. They gossip, compete, sympathise and conduct a hilarious singing lesson in unison and counterpoint. Witty, touching and virtuosic, it’s a little gem.” Sunday Telegraph
Impropera – Sat 8 Aug 8.30pm (Act 1)/ 10pm (Act 2) Sun 9 Aug 5.30pm (Act 1 )/ 7pm (Act 2)
Artistic Director: David Pearl.
Musical Director: Anthony Ingle.
Producer: A K Bennett-Hunter.
Assistant Producer: Kat Nugent.
The passion of opera meets the adrenalin of the unknown. Impropera is on-the-spot opera improvisation using audience suggestion, without score, script or safety net. You’re invited to be part of a new show built afresh every night, led by six brilliantly inventive minds and voices.
Brilliant Ingenuity – The Times. Irresistibly Funny – The Daily Telegraph
WE STRONGLY RECOMMEND ATTENDING BOTH ACTS IN ONE EVENING.
Ride/One Dark Night – Filament – Thurs 13 & Fri 14 Aug 7pm
Music and Words: Osnat Schmool
Developing part of Drive Ride Walk, a hit of the 2007 festival, a cycle courier, a pedestrian and a tango make a 15 minute love story. A touching, extraordinary tale set within the familiar movements of life in the big city. This is twinned with a first showing in profress of Filament’s new show, One Dark Night where a woman is back in her flat after another dreary day at work. Depressed, alone with a TV and fridge offering the only comfort she must welcome a new day or be lost in the shadows
The Singing Bone – Stephen Crowe – Thurs 13 & Fri 14 Aug 8.30pm
Words & Music: Stephen Crowe after the Brothers Grimm
A tale of macabre betrayal from the pen of the Brothers Grimm. This story was originally set to music by Gustav Mahler. Undaunted by this lofty pedigree, Stephen Crowe has completely re-imagined the piece and set it as an opera for children. Written for harp, marimba and flute, the exotic score will be a hit with young upstarts and old hands alike.
As I Have Now Memoyre – Nicholas Brown – Thurs 13 & Fri 14 Aug 10pm
Music, Text & Installation: Nicholas Brown
Featuring: Linda Hirst, Natasha Lohan, Nicholas Brown & Timothy Connor
How does music find clarity in the muddiness of memory? Following its sell-out premiere at Kings Place this production builds an installation-set during the performance, invites the audience to walk through it and investigates the psychology of singing through the relationship between a singing teacher and her pupil. Are you sitting comfortably? We hope not.
