TBA
Blog

What do LEGO, Peter Brook and Beyoncé have in common?

They’ve all done re-imaginings of Carmen!

Reimagining Carmen – one of the most famous operas fullstop – for our Baseless Fabric #HighStCarmen version definitely feels more weighted than our previous Cosi Fan Tutte or Die Fledermaus. There is so much history to it and so many people have so many opinions on both the character of Carmen and the story itself! However, it is also one of the most adapted stories – in fact Bizet and his librettist collaborators (Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy) adapted it themselves from Prosper Mérimée’s novella. And we are never ones to back down from a challenge of a bold re-imagining so here’s some of the good company we’re in – you might find a new favourite interpretation of this story yourself! Read more

Blog

Want to feel ‘part of the show’?

We always need a few extra pairs of hands at our Street Opera performances helping out our Stage Management – giving out flyers, moving the musicians’ music stands and keeping an eye on audiences’ safety crossing roads. It’s a fab way to be part of an exciting local community event and great fun! But don’t just take our word for it – ask Kathie, who’s helped us out at our productions over the last few years and comes back each time! Read more

Blog

Carmen & the Balloon of Hate

Our After School Opera Club are gearing up for their own final production inspired by Carmen but with their own ideas for new songs, spoken scenes and characters. They’ve worked so hard in their weekly sessions since January evolving these ideas as well as improving their acting and singing skills and we are so proud of how they’ve all developed! As part of their work they recently had a brilliant session with set designer Sorcha Corcoran and costume designer Hannah Williams where they learnt more about theatre design and shared their ideas about what their show should look like with the designers. I think every production of Carmen should have a garden party and a balloon of hate, don’t you?! Read more

Blog

Bizet meets TikTok and 10 year olds!

Our After School Club at Links Primary is now well underway and the school hall is filled with the sounds of Toreador and Habanera sung by our wonderful group of Years 4-6 and our brilliant workshop leaders Bim and Ruth. 

A few weeks ago Fizz Buckland, who plays Carmen in our professional production this summer, also joined the group for a few games, to discuss the characters and story, and of course to sing! So the group were able to hear what her (very loud!) voice sounds like and ask her questions about what it’s like to be an opera singer.

The group will be creating their own new songs and scenes inspired by Carmen over the coming months leading to their own performance this summer. Congrats to everyone involved for their hard work this term and we look forward to seeing you again after the Easter holidays! 

 

Blog

Musical joy in Carehomes’ carparks!

We are thrilled that thanks to an extremely kind grant from Postcode Community Trust we are able to provide more concerts for carehomes in Merton & Wandsworth this spring! 

Our highly successful concerts have taken place in the gardens and carparks of carehomes throughout the pandemic to spread a little musical joy to residents and staff. Our 2021 concerts reached 137 residents and 30 staff at 8 local carehomes with 98% reporting an improvement in mental wellbeing! So if you run a local carehome and would like one of our FREE concerts this May please get in touch!!

The support from Postcode Community Trust, which is a grant giving trust funded by players of People’s Postcode Lottery, will also cover some of our core costs this spring and as a small organisation we are so hugely grateful for this support. The hugest thanks to all the players of People’s Postcode Lottery for helping us to improve the wellbeing of local older people through music!

Blog

Be the first to see our new reimagined Carmen!

Die Fledermaus (2019) Production

Following on from our success of Die Fledermaus we have been busy reimagining Carmen and this is your first chance to take a peek at what we’ve been doing!

On 4th November at 4.30 pm we will be showing selected scenes from our reimagined Carmen production. This is a FREE event but we have limited capacity so if you are interested in attending please submit the following form and we will confirm your seats. Read more

Blog

Welcoming Rachel to the Baseless Fabric Team

We are delighted to welcome Rachel Kraftman to our team. Rachel will be organising our concerts for care homes and workshops for schools over the next few months. We asked her a few questions so you could get to know her!

What excites you most about working with Baseless Fabric?

I share Baseless Fabric’s passionate belief that theatre and music have the power to build community and transform society. I am so excited to be focusing specifically on community engagement and providing opera, music and theatre experiences to people who may not have had the opportunity otherwise. 

Read more

Blog

Carehomes Carpark Die Fledermaus!

Die Fledermaus Arcola Theatre

David Horton as Eisenstein & James McOran-Campbell as Falke

Despite the grey January days this particularly bleak January we have something very exciting to look forward to this summer! With the hugest thanks to the Postcode Community Trust, we are thrilled that later this year when the weather warms up, Covid restrictions are lifted a little and hopefully many carehome residents will have received their vaccine, we are able to offer South West London carehomes a FULL PERFORMANCE of our acclaimed re-imagined Die Fledermaus (4 stars – The Guardian)!

As with our recent carehome concerts, these performances will again take place in the carpark or garden of the care homes to keep residents, staff and artists safe in these changing challenging times. And we are thrilled that this time rather than just concerts we can offer a full performance of Die Fledermaus giving residents and staff an opportunity to enjoy the full story of Strauss’ operetta. Read more

Blog

Announcing our new adaptation!

We are thrilled to announce that we are re-imagining another classic opera for London life today in our unique street opera style! This time we are taking on one of the big tragic operas with perhaps the most widely recognised operatic music – Carmen by Georges Bizet!

We are so excited to take on this challenge and hugely grateful to our funders: Arts Council, Wimbledon Foundation, Samuel Gardner Memorial Trust, Humphrey Richardson Taylor Charitable Trust, Merton Council, Wandsworth Council and Three Monkies Trust. Thanks to their support we’ll be working on the creative adaptation and offering projects for local young people in 2021. We will also be fundraising further to make the final performances and further activity for young people and the elderly happen in 2022. As ever, if you feel able to support our work we’d be incredibly grateful. Read more

Blog

Covid Safe Care home concerts

During late September/early October 2020 we headed to seven different care homes across Wandsworth and Merton to provide a concert to their residents and staff to try and bring some musical joy and lift spirits during these difficult times of Covid 19. Kindly funded by Wimbledon Foundation, Merton Giving and Sylvia Waddilove Foundation we performed outside in the car parks and gardens of care homes so that residents and staff could safely enjoy our socially distanced performance. Check out our video for a peek at what we got up to! Read more

Previous 1 23 4 Next