Scottish Opera - A happy union?

Published on Tuesday 10 November 2009 17:58

WHY on Earth is Scottish Opera attaching its name to a touring production of a new work co-commissioned by Music Theatre Wales (MTW) and the Royal Opera House? Moreover, next Tuesday's one-off performance takes place in Edinburgh's Traverse Theatre with MTW's own travelling troupe of singers and musicians, and not, as one might expect, in any of our typical opera venues. What is Scotland's national opera company up to?

In essence, there's nothing particularly sinister about the project. Nor is the partnership entirely new, given that Michael McCarthy, the director of Eleanor Alberga's new opera, Letters of a Love Betrayed, is already familiar to us as the directorial brains behind Scottish Opera's creative Five:15 project, which, over the past couple of years, has seen the commissioning and performance of ten new mini-operas by Scots composers and authors, with five more in the pipeline for 2010, including Edinburgh performances at the Traverse.

It's in this context of giving opera a contemporary face in Scotland that McCarthy's MTW has been hatching a joint plot with Scottish Opera managing director Alex Reedijk. "Letters of a Love Betrayed is simply the first expression of that collaboration," says McCarthy.

This particular opera is itself of no consequence to future projects, other than serving as a typical example of the groundbreaking work MTW has undertaken since it was created in 1988, exploring exclusively the field of brand new or existing contemporary chamber opera, and its penchant for partnerships that allow its work to be seen on a UK-wide basis.

Alberga's opera, for instance, is the product of a nine-year-old relationship with the Royal Opera House (its ROH2 Genesis Programme), and was premiered in Covent Garden's exciting new Linbury Studio at the beginning of October. Based on an Isabel Allende short story, it recounts the tale of a lonely young woman whose life is transformed by a series of seductive love letters. But her dreams of happiness are lost in a brutal, loveless marriage. She feels cheated and broken, but is given the chance to unravel the deception.

Since opening in London, Letters of a Love Betrayed has received mixed reviews, most critics admiring the rich expressiveness of the orchestral writing – a small, 14-strong ensemble – but finding Alberga's vocal scoring to be short of the mark (one critic even suggesting the 60-year-old Jamaican composer should revisit Verdi for advice).

McCarthy believes the criticisms to be unfair. "I think it has many genuinely strong points, among them a lovely clear narrative," he argues. "Part of the problem might be that it is unfashionably nice. Yes, the heroine goes through tough times, but this isn't an angst-ridden hell-hole of an opera. There's a surprising twist at the end where Alberga writes some of her most beautiful, lyrical music. There's been a critical backlash on this one, but the audiences have been more open to its charms." The best thing, of course, is to see it for ourselves.

And also, perhaps, this will allow us to get a whiff of what future collaboration between Scottish Opera and MTW is likely to bring. At the moment, both McCarthy and Reedijk are keeping their cards close to their chests. But there's a clear indication from McCarthy that "shared touring circuits" are a key factor in bringing both sides together.

What that essentially means is that MTW is likely to have a more regular presence in Scotland (an extension to its long-established England and Wales touring), and that resulting projects will be extended versions of the embryonic Five:15 concept. McCarthy certainly sees potential for that.

"We've learned from Five:15 that there are many writers, composers, designers, etc. desperate to work in opera. Scotland, England and Wales all have the talent, but very little opportunity for it to happen," he says.

He believes, too, that the term "music theatre" is critical in helping grow wider audience interest in what we traditionally call opera. "I don't actually distinguish between music theatre and opera," he says. "Both are the same – sung lyric theatre. I'm not afraid of the word 'opera', but it has become a dirty word, leading to the likes of Welsh National Opera (a company, incidentally, which MTW has not had any association with despite their proximity] recently declaring itself a 'music theatre company'."

What MTW's future links north of the border seem to imply is that Scottish Opera will operate as an umbrella company for the promotion, as well as the presentation, of opera in Scotland in all its various forms. McCarthy's outfit will plug into that. From what he is saying, there is a genuine wish to build new audiences where flexibility of venue can play a part. "In England, for instance, we played the Birmingham Rep which gave us access to huge audiences from the theatre base. We want theatre audiences to cross over to opera."

More importantly, with MTW on board, there is now a real prospect for us to see new full-length works in the operatic genre, something that Scotland has hardly even paid lip service to since the halcyon days of the big Scottish Opera commissions of the 1960s and 1970s.

Sure, it would be even better if Scotland could support such activity on its own. But if cross-border collaboration is the only likely way of generating a more rounded operatic experience, then we may as well go with it.

There's one slight worry in all this, however: the continued paucity of mainstream productions in Scottish Opera's season – it's currently down to four a year with no sign of increasing. Is our national opera company in danger of turning more and more to simply facilitating opera in Scotland rather than actually performing it? There is a place for both, but tip the balance too much in the wrong direction and the company could start to talk itself out of a job.

&#149 Music Theatre Wales stages the Scottish premiere of Eleanor Alberga's Letters of a Love Betrayed at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, on 17 November.