We are back on the road with Opera Highlights this Autumn and this time we are making it groovy. With 1970s inspired costumes, join the cast as they transport to another world, where anything can happen.
Starting on 22 September, and marking our 60th Anniversary, the tour forms part of our commitment to bring opera to over 60 communities across all points of the compass around Scotland this Season. This beautifully crafted show visits Dundee, Markinch, Fraserburgh, Forres, Banchory,Cullivoe, Lerwick, Linlithgow, Town Yetholm, Stranraer, Castle Douglas, Dunlop, Gartmore, Biggar, Lochailort, Gairloch and Durness.
Director Emma Jenkins and designer Janis Hart bring verve and creativity to this year’s original piano-accompanied production. The cast includes Scottish Opera’s 2022/23 Emerging Artists Zoe Drummond and Osian Wyn Bowen who both performed in The Gondoliers and Utopia, Limited 2022, alongside Christopher Nairne and Shakira Tsindos, lead from the piano by Scottish Opera’s 2022/23 Emerging Artist repetiteur Kristina Yorgova.
Director Emma Jenkins said: ‘Four young singers in search of an identity find themselves, like Alice in Wonderland or the children of Narnia, propelled along an operatic rollercoaster of love and loss, devotion and desire, jealousy and jubilation. The overriding theme of the Opera Highlights is LOVE. Love in all its forms, both positive and negative. Our singers put on and take off various roles as if possessed by the force of love in a fast-paced performance that celebrates not only the voice, but also ensemble work and physical theatre. All this against the backdrop of Janis Hart's stunning design which combines a retro 70s feel with an anarchic theatrical space in which one feels that anything could happen!’
The production also features the world premiere of a new piece by Scottish Opera 2021/22 Emerging Artist and composer Toby Hession, with libretto by Emma Jenkins. Titled ‘Told By An Idiot’ it is a modern and humorous re-working of Macbeth.
The programme is packed with the usual mixture of the familiar and the less well-known, curated by Head of Music Derek Clark, so we are confident that there will be something for everyone to enjoy, whether you are an experienced opera goer, or coming to see us for the first time.
The playlist includes much-loved classics from Mozart’s The Magic Flute and The Marriage of Figaro, Beethoven’s Fidelio, Verdi’s Macbeth and Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers Duet alongside music by Rimsky-Korsakov, Gounod and music written by Mendelssohn when he was just 12 years old. It is the ideal opportunity to experience a selection of Opera Highlights in a two-hour performance.
Tickets are on sale now here