Feature by Dawn Smallwood
Opera North has announced its forthcoming season with an exciting line up of operas, concerts, and updates of their redevelopment project which will become the Howard Opera Centre. The centre is scheduled to open in 2021.
There are three operas lined up for the autumn season. Firstly Verdi’s La Traviata and this is then followed by an exciting double bill, celebrating the works of Leonard Bernstein, with Trouble in Tahiti and, in collaboration with Phoenix Dance Theatre, West Side Story Symphonic Dances. Thirdly, Jack the Ripper is a new opera, composed by Iain Bell and lyrics written by Emma Jenkins, is jointly commissioned and produced with English National Opera. The story fully focuses on the women of Whitechapel at the time of the killer’s terror.
The winter (2021) opens with Bizet’s Carmen and where Garry Walker, the newly appointed musical director, will make his debut. Handel’s Alcina will follow with its environmentally and responsibly unique production. This opera, for the first time, will recycle, re-use and use second hand materials for its staging, props and costumes. This is in support to join and commit to the plight in responding to the climate emergency. This is finally followed with Puccini’s The Girl of The Golden West which centres on the gold rush.
In addition to the opera there is their orchestral concert season, their audience and accessibility programmes, community engagement work and other project which ensures everyone and everywhere can access.
As usual and always, Opera North has an exciting line up and it continues to creatively and innovatively entertain, educate and address a wide range of issues that matter to one and all.