Feature: Preview - Yes at The Royal Opera House From November 22-26
Published: 17 November, 2011
by SEBASTIAN TAYLOR
IT was one of the most riveting television programmes ever broadcast: Question Time, October 28, 2009.
That was the programme when black American-British writer-commentator Bonnie Greer joined the panel alongside Nick Griffin, leader of the far-right British National Party.
Just the thought of the BNP leader airing his views on television split the country, many demanding he should not be given the oxygen of publicity. Bonnie Greer felt differently, believing all views need to be expressed freely in a democracy.
In the end, her view seemed to be vindicated.
Nick Griffin turned out to be a man of straw, unable to hold his ground in the face of opposing arguments.
But what struck her was not the debate among Question Time panellists, the rhetorical mouthing of oft-stated political opinions.
Rather, she was taken by the huge variety of opinions expressed by people in the street before the programme, the responses from the audience and the continuing national discussion afterwards.
Her experiences and the opinions voiced in the ten days leading up to the broadcast are the subject of a one-act docu-opera, Yes, commissioned, and now being produced, by the Royal Opera House’s contemporary initiatives offshoot, ROH2.
She’s written the libretto and the music has been com posed by Belize-born, Tottenham-bred composer Errollyn Wallen. The opera is a dram atic ref lection on the national debate on democracy, free speech and immigration sparked by the BBC disclosure of the controversial panel for the Question Time programme.
It involves a series of eclectic snippets where British citizens express their emotions, hopes and fears about the challenging environment they live in. Leading roles are cast for a taxi driver and a woman on the tube.
Yes is getting its premiere at the ROH’s Linbury Studio Theatre on Tuesday, followed by three more performances.
This is Bonnie Greer’s first opera and that’s not so strange in a career littered with all manner of achievements, as she’s not a musical person.
“I’m not really musical at all,” she admits. “I sing around the house, but I’ve never sung in public since I was at school in Mississippi. But music is very much a part of my daily life – that’s because I’m a synaesthete.
“This is the condition known as synaesthesia, where people experience a sort of ‘union of the senses’ whereby two or more of the five senses are automatically joined together.
“Some synaesthetes experience colour when they hear sounds or read words. Others experience tastes, colours or touches in different combinations.
“I’m a synaesthete because I hear music when I talk to someone. For instance, talking to you now I hear a flute playing, then there’s a bit of trumpet. So when I heard all those views expressed by people I met in the street and by the audience in the TV studio, I also had all sorts of music ringing in my ear. And I thought, well, that combination of the spoken word and music has the makings of an opera.
“I took the idea to the Royal Opera House and they introduced me to Errollyn and, together, we’ve got it together.
“Although I’m not an opera person, I do like opera. I like Philip Glass, John Adams, Wagner – composers who use all the approaches offered by opera to concentrate on the big emotions.
“That’s what Errollyn and I have set out to do.”
Bonnie Greer is in good hands in her collaborator. Composer Errollyn Wallen is regarded as a renaissance woman of contemporary British music, and she’s respected as much as a singer-songwriter of pop-influenced songs as a composer of new contemporary music.
She seeks to put communication at the centre of her music, engaging the audience, speaking directly to hearts and minds.
To date, she’s written 10 operas, the most recent being her take on Hilaire Belloc’s moralistic Cautionary Tales, commissioned by Opera North.
Bach is her “Number One composer” and Peter Grimes is her “Number One opera.”
So there’s a good chance we’ll get quite a variety of music when her YES composition is performed at the Royal Opera House next week.
• Yes is premiered on November 22, additional performances on November 23, 25 and 26. 7.45pm, £18.50/ students £11.50. Linbury Studio Theatre, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, WC2, 020 7304 4000, www.roh.org.uk