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Two musical and artistic experts are continuing their endeavour to make opera in the UK more diverse and accessible. Alison Buchanan is currently the only Black British female Artistic Director in the UK, and is joined by contemporary Simone Ibbett-Brown, who is a freelance performer and theatre maker, currently producing a concert that celebrates the music of Mozart and his often-erased peer Joseph Bologne Chevalier de Saint-Georges, who is thought to be the first classical composer of African descent.
Speaking to the BBC earlier in November, Alison Buchanan and Simone Ibbett-Brown spoke about the lack of representation in the classical music scene. Buchanan is the AD at Pegasus Opera Company, who focus on promoting emerging artist of African and Asian heritage. She explained:
“You wait for a seat at the table, and you realise you have to create your own table. Pegasus has been tremendous in demystifying opera, making it accessible to people who wouldn’t go to the opera necessarily, and reaching out to communities that opera companies don’t tend to reach out to.
I think it just needs to be normalised, that representation… If people come to the opera and they see something they enjoyed, or there were people that look like them, they’re more likely to come again.
The doors were always shut, and in the UK, they were always very limited in their thinking about having diversity on stage. After George Floyd died, we started having difficult, different dialogues with the opera companies, and they see things differently and optically, at least, they are doing the right thing.”
Glyndebourne Touring Opera are set to perform concerts featuring Saint-Georges’ The Anonymous Lover with Mozart’s Requiem.
Instead of a traditional concert performance, director Simone Ibbett-Brown will interweave arias, extracts, and ensembles from The Anonymous Lover with spoken theatre to bring the opera’s plot and characters together with Saint-Georges’ own life story.
In a statement, director Simone Ibbett-Brown said:
“This piece of music theatre is a little window into the incredible life of the Chevalier de Saint-Georges; Darragh Hand, playing Joseph himself, along with singers Mariam Battistelli, Guy Elliott, Alexandra Lowe, Luthando Qave, and James Way, will be exploring how this opera came to be and Saint-Georges’ impact on the course of history.”
The second part of the evening will put the Glyndebourne Chorus in the spotlight performing Mozart’s Requiem, an emotionally-charged work, featuring some of the greatest music the composer would ever write.
Joseph Darragh Hand
Léontine Alexandra Lowe
Valcour James Way
Ophémon Luthando Qave
Jeannette Mariam Battistelli
Colin Guy Elliott
Conductor Stephanie Childress
Director, writer Simone Ibbett-Brown
Fortepiano Matthew Fletcher
Glyndebourne Tour Orchestra
Milton Keynes Theatre 03 November
The Marlowe, Canterbury 10 November
Norwich Theatre Royal 17 November
Liverpool Empire 25 November
Glyndebourne, Lewes 03, 09 November
BORN: 1745 / DIED: 1799 / NATIONALITY: French
A contemporary of Mozart, Saint-Georges became a champion fencer, virtuoso violinist, and a famous composer and conductor. His hands wielded the foil, the bow and made music with equal skill! Aside from being a champion fencer and a virtuoso violinist and conductor, Saint-Georges has the distinction of being the first classical composer of African ancestry. His parents were a wealthy slave owner on a plantation in the West Indies and a slave.
So little is known of his musical training, that several myths have grown up around it. We do know that he eventually became the leader of a very good Parisian orchestra and performed his concertos with them, improvising solos at several points and wowing the audience. His appearances with this orchestra led to it being declared the best in France. Saint-Georges wrote two symphonies, several concertos, much chamber music and at least 6 operas. He pursued both fencing and music throughout his life, and towards the end of his life finally admitted that music was his true love.
Teaching resources for the music of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges
Pegasus is a professional opera company with a family of widespread international artists, participants and supporter and prides itself on staging high-quality productions while reaching out to a new more diverse audience and presenting productions with which they can identify. The company explains:
“Our productions are chosen from an accessible range of works and new commissions. We have a range of educational programmes and aim to develop new audiences through special workshops, outreach programmes that reach thousands of children, young people, adults and elders across London and the UK.”
As well as creating high-end productions, the company also run a range of activities such as a community choir, regular intimate concerts, running learning projects and mentorships for young people, representing talent, and hosting a range of online activities.
Saint-Georges’ The Anonymous Lover and Mozart’s Requiem is on tour from 3rd November – 3rd December at venues across the UK
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Michelle is a musician and composer from the UK. She has performed across the UK and Europe and is passionate about arts education and opportunities for women and girls.
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