Fingers crossed: an update
In words familiar to anyone who’s ever watched BBC Two’s Dragon’s Den: let us tell you where we are
Celebrations from 2019’s Scoring a Century ©Robert Workman
We’re still hoping to be able to run our summer training and performances at the Hackney Empire as planned. In fact, we’re right in the middle of interviewing for our training programmes, casting our operas and designing sets and costumes.
We’re not burying our heads in the sand – luckily, we’ve still got a few months grace before we need to start making the really difficult decisions. Obviously if we get to that point and need to change our plans then we’ll do the sensible thing, but things are moving so quickly it’s impossible to guess where we’ll be in one month’s time, let alone five. For the time being, however, it’s full steam ahead.
If we are able to continue with our summer season then our training will be even more essential. By that point our young opera professionals may well have been out of work, education and training for 6 months. That’s a big chunk of time for anyone in the middle of a year-long postgraduate course, and a lot of potential work or experience for anyone who was due to be involved in one of the festivals that take place over the summer. It’s going to be harder than ever for them to build a career in opera.
You can help them by supporting us through these uncertain times. Because while we’ve been able to get on with putting together our training programmes and performances, the same can’t be said for our fundraising. All charities are finding it hard, and we’re no different. We’ve had to cancel events where we’d normally raise money, and we haven’t been able to go out and chat with the generous individuals who support our work. By making a donation now, you will be making sure that this summer’s training can still go ahead as planned.
And in the meantime: cross your fingers and keep washing those hands.
