WEILL

THE SEVENDEADLY SINS

1

WELCOMEWelcome to Opera North’s new production ofKurt Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins. This is our first fully-staged theatrical production since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in March, and we are delighted to share it with you.

This production was originally planned as part of a double bill with Handel’s Acis and Galatea to open at Leeds Playhouse in mid-November for a live, socially-distanced audience, but the government’s announcement at the end of October of a second national lockdown forced the postponement of the double bill until 2021. Despite this latest setback, we remain determined to make and share work with audiences wherever we possibly can; hence this livestream performance of The Seven Deadly Sins.

I’d like to pay tribute to the spirit in which everyone involved has approached the creation of the show: our cast, Wallis Giunta, Shelley Eva Haden, Nicholas Butterfield, Stuart Laing, Dean Robinson and Campbell Russell; the creative team of James Holmes, Gary Clarke, George Johnson-Leigh and Mike Lock; all the technical staff; and of course members of our ever-intrepid Orchestra. The production has been rehearsed and staged in a Covid-secure environment, with two-metre physical distancing in place, and the entire team has embraced this challenge as a creative opportunity to be seized rather than a limitation to be endured.

I’d also like to thank James Brining, Robin Hawkes and their team at Leeds Playhouse for working together with us to realise not only this project, but also our enterprising Connecting Voices season which took place in October. We look forward to continuing our partnership with our friends at the Playhouse in the New Year.

In the months since March we have stayed true to our purpose of creating extraordinary experiences through music and opera with and for our communities across the North and beyond. We will continue to do so in the weeks ahead, through projects such as Abel Selaocoe’s soundwalk for Leeds As You Are; La petite bohème, Matthew Robins’ new animated film of Act III of Puccini’s much-loved opera; and a livestream from Leeds Town Hall on 12 December of our new concert staging of Beethoven’s great hymn to liberty and hope, Fidelio, at the end of the composer’s 250th anniversary year. Whatever uncertainties may lie ahead, we will continue to respond with creativity, courage and generosity in our determination to make music for everyone.

Richard Mantle OBE General Director

2 Switch ON - Welcome

Cover – front: Shelley Eva Haden (Anna II); back: Wallis Giunta (Anna I). Photograph by Tristram KentonThis page: Richard Mantle. Photograph by Justin Slee

3

Ballet chanté in nine scenes

Music by Kurt WeillText by Bertolt BrechtArrangement for 15 players by HK Gruber and Christian MuthspielPerformed in the English translation by Michael Feingold This streamed performance of Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins presents a preview of a new arrangement of this work by HK Gruber and Christian Muthspiel, ahead of the arrangement’s scheduled UK premiere by The Royal Opera in Spring 2021. We are very grateful to The Royal Opera for facilitating this performance. By arrangement with Schott Music Ltd., agent for The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music and the heirs of Bertolt Brecht

In rehearsal: Shelley Eva Haden (Anna II), Nicholas Butterfield (Brother), Wallis Giunta (Anna I) Photograph by Tom Arber

THE SEVEN DEADLY SINSDIE SIEBEN TODSÜNDEN

3 Switch ON - The Seven Deadly Sins

1

CHARACTERSin order of singing

Anna I Wallis Giunta

Anna II Shelley Eva Haden

Brothers Stuart Laing

Nicholas Butterfield

Father Campbell Russell

Mother Dean Robinson

Conductor James Holmes

Director and Choreographer Gary Clarke

Designer George Johnson-Leigh

Costumes realised by Stephen Rodwell

Lighting Designer Mike Lock

Assistant Conductor Martin Pickard

Assistant Director Sophie Gilpin

Dramaturgical Advisor Lou Cope

Chief Repetiteur Martin Pickard

Stage Manager Lisa Ganley

Deputy Stage Manager (Book) Abby Jones

Assistant Stage Manager Alison Best

Production Manager Ray Hain

Senior Costume Supervisor Stephen Rodwell

Costume Supervisor Mary Gillibrand

Wigs and Make-up Supervisor Jo Charlton-Wright

Textiles Natalie Needham

Costumes Opera North Costume Department

Prop Making and Scenic Painting by Mandy Burnett Lucy Campbell-Skelling Scott Thompson

Props Supervisor Mandy Burnett

Production Carpenter Jonny Hick

Livestream film credits

Director Jonathan Haswell

Script supervisor Gemma Dixon

Outside Broadcast Facilities Timeline TV

Engineering Manager James Poole

The performance of The Seven Deadly Sins lasts approximately 35 minutes

In rehearsal – this page: Shelley Eva Haden (Anna II); next page: Wallis Giunta (Anna I) Photographs by Tom Arber

4 Switch ON - Characters

SYNOPSISAnna I (who sings) and Anna II (who dances) are twin sisters. At the behest of their family, they travel to seven different American cities in order to make enough money to build a little house on the banks of the Mississippi.

In each city, the twins encounter a different deadly sin: Sloth, Pride, Anger, Gluttony, Lust, Greed and Envy. Anna I (the practical one) rebukes Anna II (the artistic one) for engaging in sinful behaviour – that is, behaviour which hinders the accumulation of wealth.

After each sin is repented in turn, they return to the new house in Louisiana.

5 Switch ON - Synopsis

11

Conductor James Holmes, director and choreographer Gary Clarke and designer George Johnson-Leigh talk to Stuart Leeks about Opera North’s first fully-staged production since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK in March.

‘We’ve got to talk about time’ says Gary Clarke midway through our conversation. Usually, Opera North productions are planned at least eighteen months in advance. Gary – along with the rest of the creative team – got the call inviting him to direct this production just three weeks before rehearsals were due to start. And just a week or so after we spoke, plans had changed again. Originally intended to open in a double bill with Handel’s Acis and Galatea at Leeds Playhouse on November 11th to a live, socially-distanced audience, the government’s announcement on Halloween of a second national lockdown forced the postponement of the double bill in the theatre until early 2021. Gary explains: ‘Usually with a project of this scale I’d have given myself a research period of several months when I’d have fully immersed myself in the piece, just to make sure that I honour the work and its context and history. We haven’t had that luxury, so I’ve been fast-tracking myself, staying up until 2 in the morning, reading and scribbling’. George adds: ‘The conversations I’d usually be having a year in advance are happening alongside the creation of the work in the rehearsal room. But there’s an excitement about that because we’re having to make decisions

quickly and respond to things as they come up in the room’. Whatever the pressures, Gary admires Opera North’s determination to stick to its mission of making and sharing music with audiences whatever the circumstances; hence the present livestream of The Seven Deadly Sins. ‘The fact that the Opera North has committed to this show is a real testament to the Company’s bravery and resilience,’ he says.

Written and premiered in Paris in 1933, The Seven Deadly Sins was to be the final collaboration between the composer Kurt Weill and the playwright Bertolt Brecht. They had scored a huge hit together with The Threepenny Opera in 1928, but their relationship soured as they worked towards the premiere of The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny in 1930. A major point of contention was their opposing views of the function of music in the theatre: Brecht distrusted anything that encouraged audiences to empathise with the characters on stage: he wanted audiences to retain their objectivity. Jim Holmes explains: ‘In many ways Brecht was a very musical man, but his view of music was that it should be functional. He didn’t have much time for the emotional power of music. Weill took another view, and when they were working together on the Mahagonny opera this fundamental difference between them was bound to come to a head. It didn’t signify a total rift at the time, but there is no doubt that their relationship hit distinctly rocky ground’.

SPEAKING OF SINS

In rehearsal: Gary Clarke (Director / Choreographer) Photograph by Tom Arber

6 Switch ON - Speaking of Sins

12

Both Brecht (a Marxist) and Weill (a Jew) fled Germany in 1933 when the Nazis seized power. Weill sought refuge in Paris, where he met a wealthy English admirer of his work, Edward James, who commissioned a new theatre piece from him. Jim takes up the story: ‘There was also a personal motive for the commission. Edward James was estranged from his wife, a dancer called Tilly Losch, and I guess he hoped to effect some kind of reconciliation with her through artistic means’. It’s easy to imagine a degree of fellow feeling between the two men, since at the time Weill was also estranged from his wife, the singer and actor Lotte Lenya. Jim continues: ‘James also admired Lenya, so the idea of a ballet chanté – a sung ballet – involving both Losch and Lenya was born. This evolved into the idea of the two playing a woman with a split personality – or alternatively identical twin sisters – with Lenya singing and Losch dancing’. Jean Cocteau was approached to supply the text, but when he refused the offer Weill and James turned to Brecht. ‘Brecht had been fascinated by the idea of representing a split personality on stage since the middle of the 1920s’ says Jim. ‘In The Seven Deadly Sins Anna I is the practical one – the ‘seller’ – and Anna II is the idealistic one – the artist if you like. And if Anna I is the seller, Anna II is the commodity. Brecht always felt that Weill was too much the dreamer and that his music needed words to render it relevant

12 Switch ON - The Seven Deadly Sins

Left – in rehearsal: Dean Robinson (Mother) Above – in rehearsal: Wallis Giunta (Anna I) Photographs by Tom Arber

7 Switch ON - Speaking of Sins

13

and practical. So in a way the piece is a perfect metaphor for the fractured state of their relationship. But it also functions on many other levels: as a critique of capitalism, of the church, of the way that women are treated in this society’.

The autobiographical context and the historical moment of the work are key to Gary’s conception of the production. ‘I love its political edge’ he says. ‘I got really angry when I first read it, especially at the hypocrisy of the family (Anna’s father, mother and two brothers). I really wanted to draw that out and give Anna and the family background and history’. For Gary, the family’s exploitation of Anna is rooted in the desperation of their situation. ‘We’ve made them German immigrants fleeing the rise of Hitler and ending up in America in the early 1930s. They’ve lost everything they had, and little did they know they’d be arriving in the depths of the Depression. So in our production they are homeless – they literally do not have a roof over their heads.’ Anna has the skills to make a fortune on stage or in film in America, so the family sends her off to make the money they need to build a new life. Her geographical journey is doubled in the production by a trip through the cultural landscape of the 1930s, with Gary referencing the films of Charlie Chaplin, the Dying Swan of Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, the extravagant Hollywood choreography of Busby Berkeley, and the ‘grotesque pantomime’ of German cabaret dancer Valeska Gert. Crucially, there’s

Left – in rehearsal: James Holmes (Conductor) Above – in rehearsal: Shelley Eva Haden (Anna II), Wallis Giunta (Anna I) Photographs by Tom Arber

8 Switch ON - Speaking of Sins

13

a visible tension in George’s design for the production between the promise of the American dream as portrayed through the lens of Hollywood and the reality of life for millions of Americans during the Depression. Gary mentions the ‘Hoovervilles’ – shanty towns of the homeless that sprang up in major American cities in the early 1930s. The set is imagined as an abandoned film studio – an ironic metaphor for the whole of the country at the time, as George explains: ‘Hollywood was still booming in the 1930s – it was probably one of the few things in America that was – so we’ve created a visual representation of the reality of the state of the country juxtaposed with the dream of Hollywood’.

It’s here that the requirement for two-metre distancing on stage has been seized by the team as a creative opportunity rather than a limitation. Each sin is contained within a box marked out on the stage floor. The space between the boxes is the ‘no man’s land’ where the family is forced to live. When one person makes a move, the effect on everyone on stage has been painstakingly considered every step of the way during rehearsals. Thus the journey of the two Annas around the set as they visit the seven American cities inevitably keeps the rest of the family on the move – a physical representation of their status as displaced people. Jim says: ‘The plight of dispossessed people is a thread that runs through Weill’s work; being in that situation himself, it’s something he could really relate to. But the thing never to forget is that he wanted to entertain the audience. There are one or two of his finest tunes in this piece and the music is constructed as a rather beautiful arch. It’s very accessible and has an immediate emotional impact, because Weill couldn’t work any other way’.

Left – in rehearsal: Campbell Russell (Father) Above – in rehearsal: Wallis Giunta (Anna I), Dean Robinson (Mother), Shelley Eva Haden Anna II) Photographs by Tom Arber

9 Switch ON - Speaking of Sins

15

ARTISTS’ BIOGRAPHIES

studied at the Royal Northern College of Music and graduated with a BMus (Hons). He has sung Count Rostov War and Peace (RNCM Symphony Orchestra); bass soloist I Giardini della storia (Batignano Festival); Michel in Martin Butler’s A Better Place

(RNCM); Schaunard La bohème (Mananan Festival, Opus 1 Opera); Carpenter and Captain Corcoran HMS Pinafore, Pooh-Bah The Mikado (Carl Rosa); Boroff Fedora, Inn Keeper Manon Lescaut and Dr Grenvil La traviata (Holland Park). He joined the Chorus of Opera North in December 2006 as an additional chorister and, subsequently, on a full-time basis in the spring of 2007. For Opera North: Pantalone The Adventures of Pinocchio, John P. Tweedledee Let ‘em Eat Cake, Bubyentsov Paradise Moscow, Dancairo Carmen, Official Registrar Madama Butterfly, Guide Death in Venice, Larkens The Girl of the Golden West, Marquis La traviata, Fiorello The Barber of Seville, Narrator in the West Yorkshire Playhouse/Opera North co-production of Into the Woods, Second Mate Billy Budd, Trio Trouble in Tahiti and Kuligin Katya Kabanova. Other highlights include being part of the award-winning Britten centenary production of Peter Grimes on Aldeburgh Beach.

NICHOLAS BUTTERFIELD Brother

was the winner of the Young Singer category at the 2018 International Opera Awards and Breakthrough Artist in UK Opera in the 2017 WhatsOnStage Awards. Recent highlights include Dodo in Missy Mazzoli’s Breaking the Waves (Edinburgh

International Festival / Adelaide Festival); and house debuts at Seattle Opera (Angelina La Cenerentola) and Deutsche Oper am Rhein (Bradamante Alcina). Operatic highlights include role debuts as Carmen, Rosina The Barber of Seville, Octavian Der Rosenkavalier (Oper Leipzig); Idamante Idomeneo (Opera Atelier, Toronto); Flora La traviata with Plácido Domingo (Royal Opera House, Muscat); Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro (The Grange Festival); The Seven Deadly Sins (Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla); Mercédès Carmen (Oper Frankfurt); Sesto La clemenza di Tito, Dorabella Così fan tutte (Canadian Opera Company); Olga The Merry

WALLIS GIUNTAAnna I

Widow (Metropolitan Opera); and Paquette Candide (Hamburger Symphoniker). In concert, recent highlights include an acclaimed solo recital at the BBC Proms in Cadogan Hall, returns to Münchner Rundfunkorchester (Mozart Die Schuldigkeit des Ersten Gebots), Koerner Hall, Toronto (Bernstein Centenary Gala), Mozart C minor Mass (Gewandhausorchester) and Beethoven Symphony No.9 (National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa). For Opera North: Angelina, title role L’Enfant et les sortilèges and Dinah Trouble in Tahiti.

was nominated in the outstanding female performance category at the 2017 National Dance Awards, voted for by the Critics’ Circle. She graduated from the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in 2014 with a First-Class BA (Hons) in Contemporary

Dance Performance, having become the first-ever student to achieve 100% on the solo choreography assessment – her Silver Shelter is now part of the school’s repertoire. She has toured internationally, and her performance credits include Sam Amos (TrashDollys), Autin Dance Theatre, Corey Baker Dance, Jamaal Burkmar (Extended Play), Gary Clarke, Maxine Doyle (Punchdrunk), Rhiannon Faith Company, ORIANTHEATRE Dance Company, Tamsin Fitzgerald (2Faced Dance Company), Keneish Dance, and Rosie Kay Dance Company. Her work as a choreographer, educator, curator and movement director is wide-ranging, spanning commissions, independent projects, staged shows, commercials, television, film and opera. Her collaborations in opera include Birmingham Opera Company’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and WAKE (Dir. Graham Vick, 2019 and 2018); the Royal Danish Opera, and Scottish Opera’s Nixon in China (Dir. John Fulljames, 2019). This is her Opera North debut.

SHELLEY EVA HADENAnna II

trained at the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Australian Opera Studio, West Australian Opera Company and Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Opera includes: Jaquino Leonore, Lensky Eugene Onegin, title role Peter Grimes, Idomeneo,

Tito La clemenza di Tito, Lysander A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Stage Manager Our Town, Squire Lovemore The Lottery, Tinca Il tabarro, Chaplitsky/Master of Ceremonies The Queen of Spades, Froh Das Rheingold, Don Basilio/Don Curzio Le nozze di Figaro, Nick La fanciulla del West, Horace Adams Peter Grimes, Remendado Carmen, Voltaire/Dr Pangloss Candide, Dick McGann Street Scene, Mozart Mozart i Salieri, King Ouf

STUART LAING Brother

12 Switch ON - The Seven Deadly Sins 10 Switch ON - Artists’ Biographies

15 Switch ON - Artists’ Biographies

L’Étoile, Tiger Brown The Threepenny Opera, Nathanael and Dr Spalanzani Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Witch Hansel and Gretel. Companies he has appeared with include: Wexford Festival Opera, Buxton Festival Opera, Grange Park Opera, Bury Court Opera, Fulham Opera, Ryedale Festival, Guildhall Opera School, West Australian Opera and Australian Opera Studio. He is a member of the Chorus of Opera North, and his roles for the Company include: Tinca, Peppe Pagliacci, Amelia’s Servant Un ballo in maschera, Third Jew Salome, Berlin to Broadway, First Armed Man The Magic Flute, Parpignol La bohème, Daniel Buchanan Street Scene.

Stuart Laing continued

was born in Australia and studied at RNCM with major support from the Peter Moores Foundation. He has appeared as principal guest artist with The Royal Opera, ENO, WNO, Scottish Opera and Netherlands Opera. Festival appearances

include the Rossini Opera Festival and Garsington. In concert he has sung under Gardiner, Haitink, Rattle, Colin Davis, Slatkin, Nagano, Pappano and Armstrong. Film appearances include: First Officer The Death of Klinghoffer and Goffredo in Judith Weir’s Armida. For Opera North: Fabrizio The Thieving Magpie, Zaccaria Nabucco, Imperial Commissioner Butterfly, Narumov The Queen of Spades, Montano Otello, Swallow Peter Grimes, Theseus A Midsummer Night’s Dream, José Castro The Girl of the Golden West, Doctor Macbeth, Doctor Grenvil La traviata, Bartolo Figaro, Betto di Signa Gianni Schicchi, David Bascombe Carousel, Don Basilio The Barber of Seville, Foreman Jenufa, Pietro Fleville/ Fouquier-Tinville Andrea Chénier, Commissar Der Rosenkavalier, Bermyata The Snow Maiden, Mandarin Turandot, Konečny Osud, Bonze Butterfly, Count Ribbing Un ballo in maschera, First Nazarene Salome, Kromov The Merry Widow, British Major Silent Night, Speaker The Magic Flute, Old Man The Greek Passion, Curio Gulio Cesare, Abraham Kaplan Street Scene; and the West Yorkshire Playhouse/Opera North co-productions of Into the Woods (Baker) and Berlin to Broadway.

DEAN ROBINSONMother

˚

studied singing at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama with Neilson Taylor. At the RSAMD he was winner of the Prize for Oratorio Performance, he also performed the roles of Nero The Coronation of Poppea, Chevalier de la Force Dialogues of

the Carmelites and Tamino Die Zauberflöte. On leaving the RSAMD he joined Scottish Opera, for whom he performed many roles. He subsequently joined

CAMPBELL RUSSELLFather

Opera North where his roles include: Remendado Carmen, Royal Herald Don Carlos, Crow Doctor and Sinister Man The Adventures of Pinocchio, Third Burgess Peter Grimes, Joe The Girl of the Golden West, Circus Manager The Bartered Bride, David Bascombe Carousel and Major-Domo Der Rosenkavalier. He has appeared many times at the Edinburgh International Festival, as well as at Lisbon and Oporto’s City of Culture celebrations. Other roles include: Rodolfo La bohème, Cavaradossi Tosca, Don Ottavio Don Giovanni, Prince Charmant Cendrillon, Lensky Eugene Onegin. He sang regularly with The John Currie Singers and has appeared and recorded with The Caledonian Tenors.

straddles the worlds of opera and musicals in a wide-ranging career. A former ENO staff conductor and Opera North’s Head of Music from 1996-2008, he has become well-known in recent years for ‘classic’ musical theatre, including: Carousel (National

Theatre); Pacific Overtures, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, Street Scene (ENO); Sweeney Todd, One Touch of Venus, The Seven Deadly Sins, Arms and the Cow, Of Thee I Sing, Paradise Moscow, Carousel and Street Scene (Opera North); Into the Woods (West Yorkshire Playhouse/Opera North); The King and I (Châtelet, Paris); One Touch of Venus (Dessau); Street Scene (Berlin); Into the Woods, Magical Night (ROH2); Pat Kirkwood is Angry (Royal Exchange Theatre/Tour); Sweeney Todd, Kiss Me, Kate (WNO); Wonderful Town (Vienna Volksoper); and The Silver Lake (English Touring Opera). Recordings include: Pacific Overtures (Grammy nomination); One Touch of Venus, Street Scene (DVD); and as pianist/arranger, Mercy and Grand – The Tom Waits Project. He has conducted as wide a range of Kurt Weill’s work as anyone in the world, is Trustee of the Kurt Weill Foundation, New York, and is currently preparing the Critical Edition of the composer’s orchestral music. In 2018 he became only the seventh ever recipient of the Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award for his services to the composer.

JAMES HOLMESConductor

GARY CLARKEDirector / Choreographer

is an acclaimed British Choreographer, Dancer and Artistic Director of Gary Clarke Company. His theatrical dance works have toured extensively nationally and internationally to both critical and audience acclaim. His work has been seen

in some of the UK’s most prestigious dance houses, including The Barbican, the Royal Opera House and the Southbank Centre. He has received many awards

12 Switch ON - The Seven Deadly Sins 11 Switch ON - Artists’ Biographies

GEORGE JOHNSON-LEIGHDesigner

Switch ON - Artists’ Biographies

Gary Clarke continued

for his work including a UK Theatre Award for Achievement in Dance, a Critics’ Circle National Dance Award, a Herald Angel Award and the Brian Glover Memorial Award. He has created stage and site-specific work for a number of other companies and organisations including Sky Arts, Ludus Dance Company, Akademi, Hull City of Culture and the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. He has worked as a movement specialist on a number of large-scale feature films including World War Z, JK Rowling’s Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and The Mummy. His performance credits include work with Matthew Bourne’s New Adventures, Lloyd Newson’s DV8 Physical Theatre, Lea Anderson’s The Cholmondeleys and The Featherstonehaughs, Sadler’s Wells Productions, Phoenix Dance Theatre and Candoco Dance Company. In 2017 Gary was appointed an Honorary Fellow at The Northern School of Contemporary Dance. For Opera North: Hansel and Gretel and Street Scene.

MIKE LOCKLighting Designer

was appointed Leader of the Orchestra of Opera North in 1978 becoming, at that time, the youngest leader in the country. His repertoire is extensive, including all of the major violin concertos. He has appeared as guest Leader with many

orchestras, including the Philharmonia, CBSO, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, BBC Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Hallé, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Bournemouth Sinfonietta, Norwegian Opera, Royal Opera House, Irish Chamber, Manchester Camerata and English National Ballet. In March 1999 he led the Orchestra of the Royal Opera on its concert tour of the USA and in November 2007 he was guest leader of the Orchestra of Norwegian Opera in Oslo. His recordings include The Lark Ascending for Naxos, conducted by David Lloyd-Jones, and the Elgar Concerto with the Hertfordshire Youth Orchestra. He is Music Director of the Sinfonia of Leeds, with whom he has made recordings of Bartók, Lutosławski, Chopin, Beethoven and Rachmaninov piano concertos. He has also conducted the Cleveland Philharmonic, the City of Leeds Youth Orchestra, the Helix Ensemble and at RNCM and Chetham’s School, Manchester. He coaches violin for the National Youth and European Union Youth Orchestras. He has also made visits to the State of Kasakhstan and has held the position of Principal Guest Conductor with its National Symphony Orchestra. He plays on a violin owned by the Yorkshire Guadagnini 1757 Syndicate.

DAVID GREEDOrchestra Leader

trained at The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, achieving a First Class BA (Hons) degree in Theatre and Performance Design. He was a joint winner of the 10th European Opera Directing Prize with director Karolina Sofulak, designing Opera Holland Park’s

2019 production of Manon Lescaut as the prize. Credits include: As Set, Lighting and Costume Designer: Vanda (Teatr Łaznia Nowa Kraków); My Night with Reg (The Lowry); Dido and Aeneas and Trouble in Tahiti (Royal Conservatoire of Scotland); Beyond Shame (Derby Theatre); The Original Chinese Conjuror (Northern Opera Group); Pirates Revisited! (Opera North Youth Company). As Set and Costume Designer: Manon Lescaut (Opera Holland Park); Influence (Derby Theatre); Who Cares? (The Lowry). As Lighting Designer: The Mountain and Other Tales of She Transformed (Leeds International Festival); Plurality of Abhinaya (Lakeside Arts); Recreation (ARC Stockton); S/HE (The Place King’s Cross). As Associate Designer: Pagliacci, L’Enfant et les sortilèges, Cavalleria rusticana, Trial by Jury, Osud, Trouble in Tahiti (Opera North); Story of Our Youth (National Youth Theatre). As Assistant Designer: I masnadieri (Teatro alla Scala, Milan); Faust (Teatr Wielki Poznan); Jenufa (Santa Fe Opera); The Reluctant Fundamentalist (National Youth Theatre).

˚

trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in stage management and technical theatre. He has worked on and lit shows covering most forms of theatre, including The Inside Outside Slide Show for Alan Ayckbourn; Charley’s Aunt, The

Price (York Theatre Royal); The Adventures of Mr Toad, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Street Scene (Lawrence Batley Theatre, Huddersfield); Grimaldi (Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond); and The Last Cuckoo, Lost Boy Racer (Co-production/LBT). As Deputy and now Head of Lighting at Opera North, Mike has been re-lighting operas for more than 20 years. Designs include revivals of La traviata, Peter Grimes, Macbeth, Jenufa and the world premiere of Jessica Walker’s Not Such Quiet Girls.

˚

Switch ON - The Seven Deadly Sins 12 Switch ON - Artists’ Biographies

In rehearsal: Shelley Eva Haden (Anna II) Photograph by Tom Arber

Music Director Garry WalkerPrincipal Guest Conductor Antony Hermus

First ViolinDavid Greed

Second Violin Cristina Ocaña Rosado

ViolaDavid Aspin

Cello Daniel Bull

Bass Diane Clark

FluteLuke O’Toole

ClarinetsAndrew MasonSarah Masters

BassoonAdam Mackenzie

Horn Alexander Hamilton

TrumpetAdam Wood

TromboneBlair Sinclair

Timpani/PercussionMark Wagstaff

PercussionChristopher Bradley

PianoPhilip Voldman

ORCHESTRA OF OPERA NORTH

13 Switch ON - Orchestra of Opera North

23

The Seven Deadly Sins Kurt Weill November 2020 Opera North Grand Theatre 46 New Briggate Leeds LS1 6NU Tel: 0113 243 9999 Registered Charity No. 511726 operanorth.co.uk