This summer you'll have three chances (at least) to join us again for our very own OPERA FAVOURITES, in town and village settings. The programme's being worked on and rehearsals will start in March. What we do know is that there will be a mix of choruses, solos and ensembles – and refreshments at each of the concerts.
The dates arranged are:
2024 concert moments: Natalia Cau; Lucy Fitt and Ant Goffart
For the first time, our year's main production was by Gilbert & Sullivan. We staged Iolanthe in the Great Hall of Shaw House, Newbury, our third production there. We, and our sellout audience, thoroughly enjoyed it! More here.
In February. Shaw House's Great Hall proved as fine a setting for The Tales, set in four great European cities, as it had for Pasha Selim's palace the year before, when we presented Mozart's Seraglio.
After a string of comedy triumphs, Jacques Offenbach's last work was this strange opera fantastique from 1881, based on the writings of the German romantic poet E T A Hoffmann, and telling the story of his three failures in love, across sometimes dubious locations in four great European cities.
Audiences were all we hoped for at our two evening and one matinee performances.
Our 2024 concert programme featured many much-loved opera favourites, and some that surely deserve to be, like the Prayer from Rossini's Moise and the introductory chorus from Verdi's Joan of Arc. The concert was co-ordinated by Duncan Powell, and led by Newbury-area talent: young conductor Theo Powell, and well-known pianist Oliver Williams.
Dates:
Thanks all round to accompanist and conductor!
