Thanks to Suffolk’s ranking in Tier One of the current regulations, I have just managed to spend a delightful two days at Snape taking in four of English Touring Opera‘s Lyric Solitude season. Staged song recitals with a singer, a dancer and a pianist – and a socially distanced audience. After a weekend in Snape they are planning (COVID permitting) to tour the show during November and early December taking in the Hackney Empire in London, Altrincham, Lancaster, Poole and Tunbridge Wells. Check in to their website for exact dates and booking information.
As they were playing in the Maltings, the programmes included a number of Britten pieces: Songs and Proverbs of William Blake, the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, a Charm of Lullabies and the Poet’s Echo. .
Also on offer were Shostakovich’s Romances on British Poetry and Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva; two wonderful. Tippett peices, Boyhood’s End and the Heart’s Assurance – plus Poulenc and Argento. Poulenc’s heart rending La Voix Humaine (the last telephone call of the jilted mistress with her lover) and the delightful A Waterbird Talk by Dominic Argento, premiered in 1977 and based on On the Harmfulness of Tobacco by Anton Chekov and The Birds of America by J. J. Audobon.
An excellent line up of singers included Jenny Stafford, Julien Van Mellaerts, Edward Hawkins, Paula Sides, Richard Dowling and Katie Stevenson, accompanied variously by Sergey Rybin, Ella O’Neill and Ian Tyndale. Rae Piper, Paul Chantry, Bernadette Iglich and Rahel Vonmoos choreographer the solitary dancers.
A delightful programme just added to the pleasure of actually sitting in a real live concert hall listening to real live music – even if you would have needed a foghorn to chat to your nearest neighbour.
Meanwhile, if you feel like making the trip to Suffolk, the Maltings now have a full programme of weekend concerts running from Fridays at 3pm to Sundays at 7pm. Check in to their website here. They also have a fine tepee erected on the lawns where you can have a delicious wood-oven-baked pizza while listenng to some gentle jazz. Or, if you prefer the music of winds, you just need to walk out onto the lawns and listen to the reeds.
Lovely evocative blog Michelle, have just read to Michael which he enjoyed.
Oh good – I am so glad Jane – please give Michael my very best and say I hope that we will see him soon at Hampstead Lane.
Bravo to ETO, and Snape. Which pieces did Rae Piper dance in? I think she is wonderful. And did Richard Dowling really sing all three of the tenor pieces? Wow! What stamina!
James, I am not entirely sure as the programme gives Rae Piper as the choreographer for Tippett’s Boyhood’s End but Paul Chantry as the dancer; Richard Dowling just sung the Donne. And bravo to the ETO and Snape indeed. Sadly an email tonight told me that they had decided to cancel this afternoon’s performance as one of the performers had tested positive for COVID (a test before they travelled) even though they had no symptoms. Even though even the front row of the audience is a good 15 feet away from the stage they decided it was safer to cancel. M
That is a shame about today. Sorry to hear that. I hope the singer is ok.
I didn’t see another tenor listed in your singers, so I made an assumption. I see now from their website that Thomas Elwyn sang the Tippett. I saw him and Richard both sing in Cosi for ETO at Snape on consecutive days, just before lockdown. Sorry I missed them both. How lucky ETO to have these singers. I will have to try and make it down to London maybe.
I hope you do, James – and that it doesn’t get cancelled!
Glad you enjoyed the performances, it was such a shame that the last one was cancelled. ETO have made a statement on their website to explain.
It was a privilege to sing in Snape again, and though I was singing Tippett it was particularly good to be singing music written for Pears in a place that is so connected to him and Britten.
Thank you to you and all in the audience. It was so great to have such a warm, and real life, audience to sing to.
Yes, such a shame about the last performance. But thank you all for finding ways to get on stage and keep liver performance ‘alive’. I hope that although we were small in numbers, our applause was some mark of our appreciation. I might even try to check in to the Hackney Empire….