A Cenerentola Adventure
A blog by Tormey Woods, baritone and BYO Ambassador
tormeywoods.com
It was the 29 July and I was filled with anticipation for my first day of rehearsals with British Youth Opera. Half nerves, half pure excitement.
The whirlwind of events that had somehow led me to be standing on the ground floor of the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts, where British Youth Opera did their studio rehearsals and BYO Workshops, about to start a completely new opera production was pretty overwhelming.
So far that summer I’d been a young artist in the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence’s new residency, Opera de-ci de-la, and made my Mozart debut as Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro with the Berlin Opera Academy. It had taken me the better half of three months to learn the role of Figaro, and with the Aix residency and month of rehearsals in Berlin on top of that, I’d been ready for some well-deserved rest before starting Guildhall in September.
But, in a twist of fate that had me jumping around my apartment excitedly and announcing to my (not quite as ecstatic) fiancée that I’d received an email asking if I’d be available to join the BYO as a member of the chorus for their production of La Cenerentola, here I was. They’d be performing the show at the Peacock Theatre in September after a six-week rehearsal period, translated into English to make it more accessible.
So, was I really going to kiss goodbye to my long-awaited holiday in exchange for the opportunity to perform with one of the best youth opera companies in the world, surrounded by dozens of other talented artists? Hell yes! After all, there’s no rest for the wicked.
For our first day of rehearsals, we only worked on the music for the chorus with the incredible assistant conductor, Chloe Rooke, who managed to get us through the entire score in one go, even letting us off early!
The second day was similar to the first, except this time we were working on getting the music learnt by heart.
Tormey (centre) on stage at the Peacock Theatre
And then on the third day, we started staging. That was it for music, in only two days we’d managed to completely learn the chorus score (which wasn’t small, either) by heart to a point where we could sing it while acting. Having worked on similar sized chorus parts before for other productions, I was amazed by how efficiently the whole thing was rehearsed by Chloe and how quickly everything was memorized by the rest of the chorus, many of whom (me included) hadn’t had much time to look at the score before the start of rehearsals. This would end up being a good indicator of how the rest of the rehearsal process would be since BYO’s La Cenerentola was the most efficient production I’ve ever had the pleasure of being a part of.
That being said, despite the fast pace everyone worked, the atmosphere still stayed relaxed and friendly. This was in part due to the small size of the cast involved (7 soloists and 11 chorus) and the whole team of directors, conductors and assistants making sure the rehearsals went smoothly and started and finished on time.
The other factor was how well everybody already knew each other. Since everybody came from a big conservatoire in the UK, everybody either already knew each other or at least had a mutual friend. Since I hadn’t started at Guildhall yet, I felt a bit like an outsider for such a tightly knit group at first, but everybody was incredibly welcoming and I was excited to be meeting so many of my peers ahead of even starting my studies.
The relaxed atmosphere prospered even after we started the staging rehearsals. The director of the production, Stuart Barker, had a fun way of working and had a lot of in-depth ideas for the way he wanted the story to play out during the show. Taking the age-old Cinderella story and making it fresh. He also went to great lengths making sure the chorus members all had a backstory and character to take inspiration from, using improvisation exercises to help us be creative with our ideas.
A lot of the staging ideas and choreography came from the movement director, Caitlin Fretwell Walsh and first assistant director Charlotte McKechnie. There was a lot of moving décor during the show, as well as a complicated bottle-throwing scene that involved the whole chorus (a lot of rehearsals went into that scene alone) and without them, it all would have been impossible. It was honestly scary how much energy everybody on the directing and stage management teams had, though it was great for us because if we ‘worked with what we were given,’ we were being given a lot.
First Assistant Director Charlotte McKechnie in cover cast rehearsals
When it finally came time to move into the Peacock Theatre, the magic that always comes from standing on a brightly lit stage with a dark void stretching out on the other side of the pit inspired a whole new level of motivation from the cast and chorus. Even after weeks of hard work getting to that point, when we started working in costume and with the orchestra, it managed to re-energize us in time for the shows.
By the time opening night came, everything was fully prepared and it was just a case of enjoying the experience. The audience was warm and enthusiastic, and thanks to the English translation, the typical Rossini humour elicited a lot more laughter than it might have in Italian with surtitles.
That being said, the second night was the truly special one for me. I had more members of my family in the room than at any other performance in my life (the advantage of performing in England for once) including my fiancée, who was there to review it for the magazine she works for and who thank god agreed the six weeks’ extra time we spent apart was worth it.
Overall, working with BYO was an incredibly magical experience and it felt really special performing my first opera in the UK with them, especially since it was my first time living in the town I was born in since the age of two.
I’m incredibly grateful to have had such a wonderful experience, and will no doubt jump at the opportunity to perform with them again the future!
Tormey Woods is an opera singer in training at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, writer and home-brewed coffee enthusiast. You can follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @tormeywoods or, for more blogs and content, you can find him on YouTube and his website, www.tormeywoods.com.