In the summer term of each year, the undergraduate BMus 3 singers always perform a reduced version of an opera. They work on their roles for most of the academic year and, for many, it is their first time tackling the complications of learning, rehearsing and performing a role in an opera.

The aim of this project is to help the students understand the processes they will need to know to work as a professional opera singer. But also, most importantly, to ‘join up the dots’ as artists: learning the music accurately and interpreting the composer’s intentions, singing text with clear diction and vocal colouring for directness of intention; acting with an understanding of and a view to communicate a character and the story-line to an audience; movement (especially while singing) and possible dancing; plus dealing with props…all as a member of an ensemble.

They begin with music calls (individual and ensemble) for the first term then move onto the staging rehearsals (the production) in the second term. The summer term is devoted to running the opera to build their performance stamina and their story-telling skills. They rehearse two mornings a week throughout the academic year, so the students have the opportunity to live with, and think about their roles for months…rather than the short few weeks of a conventional ‘opera-company’ rehearsal period.

Because of the unusual collection of voice types within this year’s BMus 3 cohort of singers, our choice of opera was somewhat more complicated. This year’s opera tells the story of ‘The Fairies’ in an amalgamation of Benjamin Britten’s 1960 opera A Midsummer Night’s Dream (set to Shakespeare’s text); Henry Purcell’s 1692 Baroque Masque The Fairy Queen; and some spoken dialogue from William Shakespeare’s 1595 play A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

​

We have renamed this opera: The Fairy Queen’s Midsummer Night.

The rehearsal process we have been using for many years for this project has proved to be a huge learning curve for young singers and sets them up for an understanding of the opera world.

​

​

– Linnhe Robertson