Opera is our lifeblood here at Longborough and we want to pass this passion on to the next generation, opening their eyes to the music, the stories, and the depth of emotion. There is so much for a young imagination to latch onto: movement, drama, set design, lighting, orchestral, singing, language, storytelling, costume, and history – the list goes on.
Longborough has a tradition of working with local children and it has grown every year. Four years ago, 100 children participated. This season, we are opening our entire programme to schools – 600 seats at dress rehearsals will be filled by schoolchildren and 1,000 in total will be reached through workshops, school visits and lectures.
The Longborough Youth Chorus aims to integrate young people to an even greater extent. We plan to programme one opera each year which involves children on stage as an integral part of the action. This will begin next year with Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen. This is a great one for young people as the subject is the cycle of life – there are roles ranging from fox cubs to caterpillars, as well as actual children as characters!
We want the Youth Chorus to be an important part of our company. This season, our summer school is our way of creating performance and learning opportunities while we prepare for 2020.
The benefits of working with children are clear. They are the future – our future performers, audiences, technicians. If we don't encourage them to develop an appetite for our art form, how will it survive?
Music and art are for everyone. If we don't believe that, what's the point in making it happen at all? We are very conscious at Longborough that we want to reach more local people and families and engage them with our work. Giving children opportunities to perform in an opera, alongside real professionals, is a great way to give them and potentially other members of their family the chance to really engage. There's a real buzz from doing something really well.
For those that will take part in our projects, I am sure they will have fun and learn from the process as well as the performances. Opera is a union of artistic disciplines. I hope they will learn about the process of making theatre with music, and making music with theatre, and be interested in how these two fundamental disciplines collide.
Our outreach programme is led by demand from state schools, both primary and secondary. We are inundated with requests and they all have one thing in common: they have virtually no financial means to pay for participation. It is testament to the commitment of Longborough's supporters that so much investment is made in this area.
Bursaries are absolutely essential to schemes like ours – we need to ensure that anyone, from any background, can get involved. The Youth Chorus has been heavily subsidised to make it affordable for all and we are offering up to 100% bursaries for the summer school in July. We don't want anyone to be able to say that they haven't applied because they can't afford to attend.
As a child, I went to orchestral summer camps. These were very exciting – I loved being part of such a big entity – and I did drama holiday clubs at the Royal Shakespeare Company and Chipping Norton Youth theatre. It all helps to form your identity and whets the appetite for more. I went to school close by and we had a truly fabulous drama department there. So many of us developed a major passion for theatre from one inspirational teacher. He had a guitar and a gong, and I remember when he showed us how Brecht used music as a central part of his theatrical vocabulary, and how music and sound are so critical to the rites of theatre.
As a director, I now often work with community groups and young people on productions. The energy and excitement they bring to a project is so special – it's something professionals can never give you.
Longborough Festival Opera runs from 5 June to 3 August 2019. Visit lfo.org.uk for tickets and more information.
