{"id":4530,"date":"2018-08-02T19:42:19","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T18:42:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larkreviews.co.uk\/?p=4530"},"modified":"2018-08-02T19:42:19","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T18:42:19","slug":"marys-hand-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/?p=4530","title":{"rendered":"Mary\u2019s Hand"},"content":{"rendered":"
Tete a Tete: The Opera Festival<\/span><\/strong><\/h6>\n
McCaldin Arts<\/span><\/strong><\/h6>\n
Holy Cross Church, Cromer Street, London<\/span><\/strong><\/h6>\n

He who tires of London tires of life. Well it\u2019s certainly never short of surprises. This is \u201cmy\u201d city and yet hardly a week goes by without my discovering a venue, space or place I didn\u2019t even know was there. The rather beautiful Holy Cross Church in Cromer Street, King\u2019s Cross, for example, was completely new to me. Built in the 1880s by Reginald Peacock it provided a surprisingly apt backdrop for a short operatic piece about Mary Tudor \u2013 aisle, pulpit, chancel steps and a handy prie-dieu all had a part to play.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Mary\u2019s Hand<\/em>, with words by Di Sherlock and music by Martin Bussey, is a musical monologue about Mary Tudor \u2013 a sort of autobiography in words (mostly sung but occasionally spoken) and music. It seeks to make us think about very familiar mid 16th<\/sup> century events from the point of view of someone who has been, generally, demonised by history. Yes, Mary ordered the execution of the \u201cprotestant martyrs\u201d (not what she called them) but as talented mezzo Claire McCaldin sings with angry passion. \u201cArchbishop Cranmer? He made me a bastard.\u201d<\/p>\n

The piece is predicated on Mary\u2019s passion for card games and McCaldin occasionally invites an audience member to draw a card which she then attaches to a display screen and moves on the next section of her story. This device determines the order in which the sections run but the 80 minute opera would have worked perfectly well without it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s quite a performance from McCaldin who wears a fabulous brown and cream dress with fur sleeves, modelled on the 1553 portrait by Hans Eworth and paid for by crowd funding. The dress then gradually comes apart to symbolise what\u2019s happening to its wearer. At the end she walks back down the aisle in a simple white undergarment (shroud?) carrying a candle like Lady Macbeth.<\/p>\n

McCaldin is variously eye flashingly sexy, imperious, wistful, resigned and angry. And she maintains a remarkable level of energy given that this is effectively an 80 minute solo. Her voice includes some ruby red impassioned low notes and some fierce, sometimes hysterical, high ones.\u00a0 She manages the emotional contrasts with verve.<\/p>\n

She is accompanied by an all female\u00a0 trio \u2013 hidden behind a pillar and therefore invisible from my seat, unfortunately \u2013 consisting of trumpet, cello and oboe\/cor anglais. Martin Bussey\u2019s evocative music uses some interesting effects including col legno<\/em> cello, rapid pizzicato, lots of off beat blasts and a strange purring tongued effect on the trumpet. Words and music complement each other seamlessly. Don\u2019t go to this if you want melody and \u201cnumbers\u201d but it\u2019s worth catching if you\u2019re looking for passion and convincing acting within eloquent music.<\/p>\n

Susan Elkin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tete a Tete: The Opera Festival McCaldin Arts Holy Cross Church, Cromer Street, London He who tires of London tires of life. Well it\u2019s certainly never short of surprises. This is \u201cmy\u201d city and yet hardly a week goes by … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4530"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4530"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4532,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4530\/revisions\/4532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}