Blog

Introducing our Opera Taster Workshop Team!

We’re super excited that this brilliant team will be delivering our highly successful programme of Opera Taster Workshops based around our new adaptation of Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love. In collaboration with our partners, the local music hubs – Merton Music Foundation, Wandsworth Music Service and Croydon Music & Arts – we have arranged workshops at primary schools across Merton, Wandsworth and Croydon. Over the next few weeks they will be reaching 100s of children across South London with the power of music and drama and hopefully having lots of fun with opera!

Amaarah Roze

Amaarah Roze is an international facilitator, performer, event producer and public speaker. Dedicated to creating work that explores identity, honesty and empowerment, Amaarah has worked with young people across the UK in arts, education, community, sports and corporate sectors. She has supported over 1000 young people across the country to develop their skills and celebrate their talents – on stage and off.

 

 

Louisa Tee

​​Louisa trained at the RWCMD, Trinity College of Music and ENO Opera Works. She has worked with Opera Holland Park, Raymond Gubbay and Opera UpClose working in the West End and touring the UK. Roles include Mimi in La Boheme, Donna Anna in Don Giovanni, Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro, Fiordiligi for Cosi Fan Tutte for Baseless Fabric and Violetta in La Traviata where she was nominated for an Off West End awards for best actress. Louisa is passionate about taking opera into schools and she is very excited to be returning to Baseless Fabric.

 

Giles Kennedy

While at school Giles’ musical upbringing was a strict diet of Bach, Beethoven and Brahms, and he went on to study piano, cello and chamber music. Giles read Mathematics at Oxford and for a decade or so pursued a career in Operational Analysis and website design and development. Music was never entirely absent though, be it participating in occasional masterclasses, further studies on cello, as cellist of the SW London-based chamber ensemble Gli Amici della Musica with whom he performed many concerts, or as Director of Music at the Church of the Holy Name, Esher, and of the Arundel & Brighton Diocesan Pilgrimage to Lourdes. Happily, music eventually took over and Giles now has a varied portfolio of musical engagements from solo, chamber and orchestral performing to teaching and instrumental and choral accompanying. He also co-founded the baroque ensemble Original Blend.

Lucia Martinez

Lucia is an Italian freelance performer, facilitator and producer. Graduated from the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire in 2021, her main interest as a theatre-maker is to devise original and collaborative multidisciplinary pieces finding storytelling alternatives to the spoken word. She is passionate about connecting local creatives and utilising art as a commentary on societal and contemporary issues, spreading awareness on untold stories. Co-founder of the collective JunkJunkie, she has discovered the power of working for and within a community and making theatre accessible to all, focusing on the transformational power of the arts.

Blog

Our next street opera!

We are super excited to announce that we have received funding from several amazing funders including Arts Council England and Wandsworth Council towards the Research & Development of our next street opera adaptation and a whole heap of associated activities – school workshops, elderly concerts & artist development. And this time it’s Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love so think love triangles, love potions & silliness all happening on South London high streets today. The adaptation will be written by the team behind our previous street opera adaptations – composer Leo Geyer and librettist Joanna Turner – so they will get cracking over the next few months and we’ll be sure to invite you to a taster sharing later in the year…. Exciting times!!