Flying the flag for opera at the Festival
Without the arts, a town has got nothing, says Roger Clayden who brings genuine passion to the opera night he has organised and will be narrating for the Festival of Chichester.
It will be happening on Saturday, June 29 at 7.30pm at The Jeneses Community Centre & Food Bank, 45 Linden Road, Bognor Regis, PO21 2AP, offering six soloists and an orchestra of 24 all – remarkably – on a budget of just £4,500 and the hope of breaking even.
“The idea is all about trying to connect the opera and the arts to the community and give them the opportunity to walk along and hear lots of opera and have it explained to them. I will be narrating. I think opera has been ignored a bit. There's not so much music in schools and where can young people go to hear it? There is nothing really happening around here. You think it's wonderful that we've got co vent garden but you can' t fit 60 million people into co vent Garden. we need something for people close to here. I'm hoping to sell out but the problem is that so many people just don' t know about opera.
“To put on a full-scale opera would cost £50,000 to £100,000 and that's just not a proposal. The budget for this is £4,500. I've got spreadsheets for every single one of the opera nights we' ve done and we have broken even on all of them apart from the one two years ago when there was a heat wave and people didn't want to come.
“But it is so important. The arts are all about people expressing themselves and that's what we need to do but you don' t have dance lessons or trombone lessons or painting lessons any more so much. This is about bringing people together to enjoy the arts.”
Tickets £18, under-25s £9 from the Festival of Chichester box office. Act 1 from 7.30pm-8.30pm will include Overture – Die Zauberflöte (Magic Flute) by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; Dalla sua pace, from the opera Don giovanni by wolfgang amadeus Mozart; William Tell Finale Overture by Rossi ni; and Habañera from the operageorge biz et. act 2 from 9pm-10pm will include: Arrival of the queen of she baby george F Handel; Seguidilla, Carmen from the opera Carmen by Georges Bizet; Overture to II Barbiere di Siviglia by Rossini; and Mon coeur s’ouvre à ta voix, (Softly awakens my heart) from the opera Samson et Dalila by Camille Saint-saëns.
Guest soprano is Stefanie K em ball-read. stefanie trained at trinity college of music, london graduating with distinction from their postgraduate diploma programme. Having initially trained as a banker in the City of London, she left finance behind for a varied performing career. Renowned for her high vocal acrobatics, she has performed extensively throughout Europe and the UK in more than 25 leading soprano roles.
Guest tenor Julien L'hermite is travelling from Switzerland specially. He is 25 years old and wants to make a career out of singing. A tenor opera singer and the son of a Japanese pianist, he started studying classical singing at the age of eight through private lessons in Switzerland.
•This year, the Festival of Chichester is delighted to welcome Kenton Budd Estate Agents as its principal sponsor.