• News
  • About
  • Events
  • Media
  • Repertoire
  • Gallery
  • Contact
Lucy Morton

Trouser roles, Teacups and New Music

3/16/2016

0 Comments

 
March certainly snuck up on us all rather fast, and with that came the highlight of my 2016 so far - Out at Sea. From being invited onboard (excuse the pun) by composer, Blanka Stachelek, in July to starting rehearsals in November, this has been a huge opportunity to not just stretch my legs as a contemporary performer, but also experience performing an opera with an extremely small cast, in the round.                          
​                                 
In the middle of all that, Via Nova spent the weekend working on music by Howard Skempton and a new work by Percy Pursglove with non-professional singers and instrumentalists. This was in preparation for the Contemporary Music for All Festival concert with Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and Via Nova. What a great concert and my first solo venture at the CBSO centre!

Then straight into the final few days of rehearsals for the Conservatoire Triple Bill, where I played the China Teacup in Ravel's L'Enfant et les sortileges. Going from an overweight, cannibalistic man to a dainty 10yr old in a teacup in less than a week was certainly a shock to the senses! Sadly this was my last Conservatoire opera (I think!) but it's been an incredible five years working with Michael Barry as director, and Fraser Goulding as my musical director for three years!

A huge thank you to everyone in all the backstage teams involved in both projects: Wardrobe, lighting, makeup, even getting us on stage sometimes is a pain!
​​
An exciting week is ahead: a brilliant concert of John Joubert with Chamber choir and plenty from Via Nova and Frontiers Festival  2016! I am also incredibly lucky to be having a piece of music written for me by the absolutely brilliant Patrick Giguére (you can hear his other works HERE) ready for performance in April.


Picture
Via Nova in rehearsal with visiting singers - BCMG, CBSO Centre
Picture
Out at Sea team
Picture
China Teacup in the Ravel - Graeme Braidwood Photography
Picture
Out at Sea review
0 Comments

New Year - Full Steam Ahead

2/2/2016

0 Comments

 
*apologies, both 22.12.15 and 02.02.16 posts were deleted, have now been reposted*

Well what a soggy Christmas and New Year that was! All my love and thoughts to everyone who lost their homes and belongings to the floods.
​

Straight back to Birmingham to do the first public showing of Grey Matter. An incredible project I am involved in with director Gavin Thatcher as part of Birmingham REP Theatre's Foundry Programme. Focussing on the effect of stroke in people in a piece of physical movement theatre, using professional theatremakers, musicians and community theatre actors. Being involved in this has been one of the most eye opening and physically demanding projects I have taken on so far - be sure to catch the final performance on April 8th!

Otherwise it is rather quiet on the live performance front until March. But this is when all the magic happens - rehearsal time. Work is well under way for the premiere of Blanka Stachelek's Out at Sea first weekend in March. As well as vocal and orchestral rehearsals, the cast went for costume fittings with the very talented costume makers at BCU in early January. This is a huge project to be involved in, the excitement in Poland for the great writer Mrozek's work to be introduced on the operatic stage to a British audience is palpable. It's also a huge character shift for me - my first proper 'trouser-role' as well as some extremely energetic staging on a rather limited stage.

We are also in rehearsals for the Conservatoire Spring Opera triple bill! Vaughan-William's Riders to the Sea, Holst's Savitri and Ravel's L'enfant et les sortileges promises to be an emotional but magical night at the Crescent in March.
 
See you all then! - L x 
Picture
In rehearsal for Out at Sea - Candian Li
0 Comments

Closing up 2015

12/22/2015

0 Comments

 
*apologies, both 22.12.15 and 02.02.16 posts were deleted, have now been reposted*

It's Christmas time! And what an incredibly musical season it has been.
November kicked off with a beautiful concert of Lalande with the Conservatoire Chamber Choir, directed by Jeffrey Skidmore. Singing music only recently transcribed by Nicola Starkie - quite the honour to perform some tricky alto solos as well as such amazing ensemble music for the first time in many, many years!
Via Nova had the pleasure of working with and performing the music of Karin Rehnquist during a week of events centered around her residency. We also premiered a piece by Chloe Knibbs which we shall be revisiting in 2016 in a further Frontiers project. At the end of November, Via Nova were also invited to perform at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival as part of their shorts series.
The Conservatoire Opera Scenes were another hit - some incredibly difficult music including scenes from Parsifal, Magic Flute, and even an entire act of La Boheme! Amazing experience working with Paul Wingfield and Jamie Hayes on my last ever Conservatoire scenes.
Finishing off the Conservatoire Autumn term with a lovely festive early music concert with Martin Perkins and William Lyons in a programme of seasonal music from medieval to baroque periods.

It's been an absolutely incredible 2015 - Thank you to everyone for all their support throughout. Now it is time for a few days R&R with my family in the North, (of course) singing with my childhood choir over the festive period.
May I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a brilliant New Year - L x
0 Comments

French Baroque, Final Recitals and Recording!

6/27/2015

0 Comments

 
The past three months have been some of the most hectic and significant in my career so far! 
After a lovely 'Concert for Peace' in Grassington with Graham Coatman, and a short week of rest at Easter I dove straight in to my final(!!!) semester as an undergraduate at the Conservatoire. First, a baroque double bill: John Blow's 'Venus and Adonis' and Marc-Antoinne Charpentier's 'Actéon'. I was cast in the role of the nymph, Hyale in Actéon and in a little over three weeks we produced a show we were all really proud of. It was an absolute joy to work with a baroque orchestra for the first time, and the beautiful dresses we were put in were definitely a plus! 

In the middle of all this I also gave my Bachelor of Music Final Recital, which had a broad range of repertoire including Orlandini, Poulenc, Bizet and Weir. I will be uploading some recordings from this concert on the media page, along with some highlights from 'the little match girl passion' performance I directed and performed in as part of the Frontier's Festival in February - so keep your eyes peeled! 

I then headed back up to my hometown of Harrogate to rejoin St Peter's church choir, of which I have been a part of  for 16 years, to celebrate the retirement of our vicar, Tony Shepherd. It has been an absolute honour to be part of that choir for so long, but also to return for such a significant event also meant that I saw many people I haven't seen for so many years, including the composer Philip Wilby and his wife, Wendy. Philip was choirmaster when I joined the choir as an overly energetic (and distracted) seven year old, and gave me my first ever choral solo, so reuniting with them was a huge highlight to what was an amazing weekend of choral celebrations.

On my return to Birmingham, we began the new Conservatoire Chamber Choir recording of Vaughan Williams, Holst and Howells disc for Somm Records, which is due to be released next year! 

As mentioned, there will be some new media uploaded to the website shortly, as well as some pretty exciting news to be announced within the next few months! But here is some candid/backstage photos of my recent adventures!
Picture
With Graham Coatman in Grassington
Picture
Final Recital Programmes
Picture
Daphne, Diane et Hyale - Acteon
Picture
with Phil and Wendy Wilby - St Peter's Church, Harrogate
Picture
Conservatoire Chamber Choir Recording 2015 - St Albans, Highgate
Picture
Conservatoire Chamber Choir Recording 2015 - St Albans, Highgate
Picture
Conservatoire Chamber Choir Recording 2015 - St Albans, Highgate
0 Comments

New Website and Frontiers Festival 2015

3/31/2015

1 Comment

 
Finally, at the end of a very busy month, the new website is live! 

For the past two weeks, venues around Birmingham have been buzzing  with world premières, collaborations, and innovations from the students and staff of Birmingham Conservatoire, as well as special guests and international stars.  
 I was lucky enough to be involved in two of the concerts: a world première of 'Silence', for voice and chamber ensemble by Yfat Soul Zisso, in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery as part of the 'Vocal Marathon' day, as well as my own production of David Lang's 'the little match girl passion'.
This year's Frontiers focused on the use of technology in music, especially how the boundaries of electronic and acoustic music can intersect. It has been a such a joy and inspiration to see the results of exploration into experimental music, and certainly got a few of us talking about future projects!

You can read the full overview of the festival here!
1 Comment

    Archives

    March 2016
    February 2016
    December 2015
    June 2015
    March 2015

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.