Page 218 - Guildhall Coverage Book 2020-21

We began with Amy Crankshaw and Clare Best's The Apothecary, an intriguing tale set in 18th
century France where Madeleine (Olivia Boen) despairs of her lover Francois (Thando Mjandana) and
his philandering with Elise (Laura Fleur) and Pauline (Laura Lolita Peresivana). Madeleine consults an
Apothecary (Adam Maxey) who offers her remedies for the situation. But the apothecary's fascination
for Madeleine, and her fascination for the art of the apothecary lead to a surprising conclusion.

Whilst Best's libretto had period features, Crankshaw's music did not and the opening sounds in the
orchestra were firmly contemporary. Crankshaw used the orchestra in two ways, to support the
singers melodically and harmonically, and to provide an intriguing counterpoint and comment. Clearly
Crankshaw relishes what voices can do, so that the scenes between the Apothecary and Madeleine
discussing the apothecary's art had a real feeling of ecstasy to them. Yet, the sound world was
modernist too, certainly and intriguing mix and a wonderful creditable and engaging work.

Ramster's staging combined period costumes with a more abstract setting, and almost without
disturbing the music the scene changed (and the orchestra did, as the two period pieces were played
by different players) and we were led into Carissimi's judgement of Solomon which was played almost
as a tableau. Solomon (Chuma Sieqa), and the two women (Laura Lolita Peresivana and Olivia Boen)
were in period costume whilst Historicus (Brenton Spiteri) and the chorus were in modern dress. It
worked because the singers imbued the music with so much style and emotion. Spiteri was engaging
as the narrator and Sieqa made a suitable gnomic Solomon, whilst Peresivana and Boen really
brought the two women's contrasting positions expressively to the fore. It is a short piece, and I have
to confess to never having seen it before, but here the performers really made it work.

And then we slipped straight into a very different world, Eintänzer from Aran O'Grady and Kaitlin
Sullivan. This opera, for me, was the highlight of the evening partly because the performance of
Brenton Spiteri as Julius really lit up the piece, but also partly from the stylistic confidence the two
creators showed. The setting is a middle European city in the 1930s where the partisans are almost
defeated and the enemy is at the walls. In the ruins of the nightclub, the taxi dancer Julius (Brenton
Spiteri) hustles for customers, dancing with the dowager Savoia (Laura Lolita Peresivana), but the
customers are not interested they waiting for help to leave. This arrives wtih Quicklime (Amy
Holyland) and after some trouble they leave. Julius says he goes tomorrow as Quicklime has given
him an unused visa, but he seems wedded to his ruined life in the city. His wounded ex-boyfriend now
partisan Charlie (Florian Panzieri) appears the two have one last dance, and finally Julius sends
Charlie on his way with the visa, and sits and waits for the end.

O'Grady has a talent both for writing tunes and for re-creating the shape of 1930s dance numbers, but
he also was able to take this sound world and create something edgier and more disturbing so that
the opera felt all of a piece, the dance numbers did not stand out, yet the whole was never pastiche.
And Brenton Spiteri as Julius managed to combine a startling Fred Astaire-like ability on the dance
floor with a wonderful expressibility, his Julius was rather moving. The other cast were equally well
cast so that this was an ensemble piece, Amy Holyland moved beautifully from Quicklime's brisk
public persona to the moment when she tells Julius about the death of her boyfriend, whilst Laura
Lolita Peresivana as the touchingly desperate Savoia was unrecognisable from her previous
appearances in the evening. The end, when Florian Panzieri's Charlie joined Julius for a final duet
and a dance could so easily have been maudlin but it was a testament to all concerned that it was
not. Inevitably, we might think of Kurt Weill when we listen to this, though O'Grady's sound world is
different, but also the drama of Menotti's The Consul comes to mind too.

After the interval the set had been re-set as the office of a Russian general during the Soviet era. Abel
Esbenshade and Aubrey Lavender's I'm Cleaning, I'm Cleaning was a dark farce. Involving a
depressive General (Chuma Sijeqa), his irrepressible Attache (Eliran Kadussi), a cleaner (Laura Lolita
Peresivana), a spy dressed as a cleaning lady (Olivia Boen) and the voice of a telemarketer (Laura
Fleur), the piece led us to the nuclear bomb end of the world via some vividly imagined crazy action. It
was full of delightful details, such as the way counter-tenor Eliran Kadussi would camply mince off
stage singing revolutionary songs or the delightful concept of the telemarketer trying to sell tractors by
phoning the red nuclear phone!

Yet there were serious elements too, the General's suicide was given adequate background and
whilst his cadaver became the centrepiece for comic action what led up to it was sympathetically