THE RIDERS by West Australian Opera

WEST AUSTRALIAN OPERA 2016

THE RIDERS

Composer’s Message “a bewitching jewel of contemporary music theatre.”

I was drawn to Tim Winton’s The Riders a novel that draws on aspects of ancient European mythology - because my work with indigenous Australians had made me ask where my own ancient stories lay. It’s a story that traverses Europe, the birthplace of opera, but is viewed through the eyes of an Australian - Scully - a ‘desert Irishman’ as Winton puts it. Given my long relationship with Tim (the stage adaption of Cloudstreet, his first play Rising Water and then film of The Turning) this felt like it could be my story to tell. When conceiving a musical world in which the Riders would live, I wanted a palette that could speak as much to other musical traditions as to a conventional operatic language. To this end, the orchestration includes Accordion, Bouzouki and Recorders and the music not only intimates various vernacular musics – folk, cabaret, music hall - but also directly quotes folk songs, including the novel’s own linking refrain On Raglan Road. Whilst these elements lend certain qualities to the work, structurally it is quite formal. The interlocking harmonic languages of the characters utilize elements of Serialism, hexachordal tropes and minimalism. Scully’s melodic motifs center on the interval of the Perfect 4th, which when cycled, generates the key structure for the work. Jennifer’s

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The Australian

music is dominated by harmonies created from expanding and contracting 10ths, and the Riders themselves owe their rhythmic life to 12/8 galloping figurations while their harmonic language is derived from a tone row that turns ever inwards. For this, its second production, I have taken the opportunity to make some revisions. I must thank Brad Cohen and all at WA Opera for offering me this opportunity - it’s rare and deeply appreciated. I’d also like to thank Neil Armfield, who was there at the birth, Alison Croggon, who delivered such a beautifully poetic response to those discussions; Richard Mills, Marion Potts and all the creative team and finally to the cast - both from the premiere season, but now to this thrilling group that Brad has assembled. At its heart, The Riders is about the nature of love. It deals with questions of how well we can truly know someone; how well we can truly know ourselves. And writing The Riders has been just such a process of self examination for me. There’s a lot of me in it. My hope is that it feels like your story too. Iain Grandage COMPOSER

Librettist Message “A haunting sprawling, gut-wrenching tale from a prodigiously talented young novelist” Esquire

In effect, I’ve attempted to translate The Riders into another form. Early on, Iain Grandage and I decided that the most important thing was to be true to the emotional narrative of The Riders, and in order to do that, we’ve approached the book with a free hand.

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Although I’ve written a number of libretti, I’ve never adapted a novel before. They’re not the most obvious form for opera. Tim Winton’s The Riders is more than a hundred thousand words long; in order to turn it into a work of music theatre, I’ve had to boil that down into something less than ﬁve thousand.

The Riders is about a man whose wife inexplicably abandons him and his daughter. Scully, one of Winton’s bluff, emotionally inarticulate men, is renovating a house in Ireland, waiting for his wife Jennifer and his daughter Billie to arrive from Perth and complete the home he is making for them. But when he goes to the airport, only Billie, traumatised and silent, is waiting for him. The novel consists of what unravels after this event, as Scully hunts frantically through Europe for his wife.

Perhaps the most obvious change we’ve made is the presence of Jennifer. In the book she is simply an absence; in the opera, mindful that it’s hard to stage an absence, we’ve given her a voice.

The Riders are Scully’s hauntings, a band of horsemen who ﬁrst turn up at the castle near his bothy. They are both real and phantasmagoric. For us, they are our chorus: both witnesses to and symptoms of Scully’s panic and paralysis.

New Australian Work Mostly, we’ve tried to write a work that brings the emotional power of music and poetry to Winton’s story, to open up some of the complexities of love. An opera. I hope you enjoy it. Alison Croggon LIBRETTIST

Director’s Message “Scully, the down-to-earth Australian male – a meatand- potatoes kind of guy – is brought to life through this heightened and deeply enculturated operatic form”

Creating an opera of The Riders carries in itself an interesting tension. Scully, the down-to-earth Australian male – a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy – is brought to life through this heightened and deeply enculturated operatic form, a form that would not routinely be part of his own lived experience.

But the lens through which we encounter this story very much supports it: it provides for something intimate yet epic, physical but metaphysical, for something that conjures the mysterious ‘otherness”’ of the Riders, and represents Scully’s traumatised, pixelating brain - at the very same moment as it allows for the outpouring of high-stake human emotion. Alongside librettist Alison Croggon, Iain Grandage is the Australian composer who synthesises these contradictions and gives their internal tension a final cohesive expression. His own personal connection to the story and his prodigious talent bring into focus aspects of our cultural consciousness: the Winton phenomenon and his view of Australia via our experience of other countries, languages, and forms. At some level it’s a nod to the hybridity of our European culture – an Australian story that doesn’t take place in Australia – that is in a constant search, elsewhere.

The creative team broached the design with a number of key ideas drawn from the text. It felt important to anchor the world in Scully’s own experience of it. Building is a central activity, a vehicle for his devotion and his tenacious pursuit of an ideal – the small house in Ireland like a humble cathedral for the deification of Jennifer. It is dwarfed by Notre Dame, but is every bit as towering. Scully in it, is an ineffectual, galumphing Quasimodo. Many of our conversations turned back to The Riders themselves, these strange preternatural creatures that seem to exist both inside and outside of Scully, somehow channelling his terror. Are they an extension of Scully himself, figments of his nightmares, or real creatures of the night? Finally, the globe no less, is the setting for this story. We wanted to conjure its shape, its enormity, its liminality – as if we were almost trapped inside it as well as traversing its surface and always in danger of falling off. It’s an elusive world that like Jennifer is always just beyond our grasp, and that keeps re-setting its own horizon line. Journey, motion, became important things to address within the design. All of these discoveries were borne of a proper collaborative environment. Marion Potts DIRECTOR

age Iain Grand

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ACT I Scully is renovating his house in Ireland, waiting for his wife Jennifer and his daughter Billie to join him from Perth. Jennifer, Billie and Scully sing together, and we hear the hint of shadows in the marriage. Scully has his first vision of The Riders. We glimpse Billie seated with Jennifer on a plane, reading her favourite book, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Meanwhile Scully waits at Shannon Airport. Only Billie arrives. ACT II In Greece, Arthur, a British expatriate, stands in a bar thinking of the Australian family who left six weeks before. Scully turns up with Billie, questioning Arthur about his suspicions that Jennifer has left him for the painter Alex. Mad with jealousy, Scully drags Billie off to confront Alex, but Jennifer isn’t there. When he returns to the bar, he is told Alex is dead and the police believe Scully is responsible. He is about to flee with Billie when she is attacked by a dog. ACT III Billie and Scully travel to Italy where they discover that Jennifer is in Paris. Billie is becoming increasingly ill from the dog bite and in desperation Scully goes to Jennifer’s friend Marianne in Paris. She taunts Scully, accusing him of beating Jennifer, and he steals her wallet and runs off. Drunk, Scully glimpses Jennifer and chases her into Notre Dame, where he has had a vision of Jennifer as the Madonna. In his darkest despair, Billie saves him. They return to Ireland, where Scully sees The Riders for the last time.

Composer Iain Grandage Librettist Alison Croggon Conductor Brad Cohen Director Marion Potts Set and Costume Designer Dale Ferguson Lighting Designer Matt Scott Sound Designer Guy Smith Featuring Genevieve Lacey (Recorders) Scully James Clayton Jennifer Emma Pearson Billie Mia Beattie and Rosanna Radici Arthur Wade Kernot Marianne Fiona Campbell Alex Matthew Lester Stage Manager Karen Farmer Assistant Stage Manager Erryn Hanson Head of Wardrobe Sue Kerr Head of Wigs Christopher Lyons Make Up Sharon Krywood Surtitle Operator Allison Fyfe Repetiteur Tommaso Pollio Musical Preparation Marilyn Phillips Dresser Jenny Poh and Holly Sansalone Pre-Performance Talks Annie Patrick Voiceover Danny O’Toole

Artistic Director’s Message

As Vice Regal Patron of West Australian Opera, I am delighted to welcome you to the 2016 opera season. West Australian Opera enjoyed a wonderful start to the year with the annual City of Perth’s Opera in the Park. Thousands of people gathered together in Langley Park and around the state to enjoy Puccini’s comic opera Gianni Schicchi, a free event supported by the City of Perth, Lotterywest and Healthway with the message ‘Alcohol.ThinkAgain’. Now at His Majesty’s Theatre we commence the main stage season with this production of The Riders composed by Iain Grandage with librettist Alison Croggon. West Australian Opera is proud to present this new production for the first time in our state. Based on the novel by West Australian author, Tim Winton, this modern opera sung in English has gathered much acclaim.

Our mission at West Australian Opera is to tell stories through the medium of the human singing voice. As Artistic Director, and as an Australian, it is my delight to present, for the first time in Perth, a major new Australian work by an all-Australian creative team, with a largely Australian cast. Far from tub-thumping nationalism, it’s precisely the diversity of our personal histories and stories which makes us Australian – and our dialogue with the world beyond these shores is part of the subject with which The Riders deals.

As we look ahead, 2016 promises a season of delightful opera. The season will weave a unique cultural tapestry that enriches the landscape of the arts in our state. I do hope you enjoy the works presented this year. I join the Chairman and General Manager, in acknowledging generous support from the State and Federal governments, as well as expressing appreciation of private and corporate supporters. Her Excellency The Honourable Kerry Sanderson AO GOVERNOR OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Governor’s Message

Telling stories through song has a long and important history, from the earliest days of indigenous settlement. As relatively recent incomers, we are increasingly aware of how song and landscape speak to each other. As we continue to develop an Australian operatic sensibility, a rich variety of musics is decanted into our expression. Iain Grandage’s work with Alison Croggan is rich in this mixed variety, a story sung with directness, intensity and freshness. It is our delight and our responsibility, to support the development of new work, to refresh the language and possibilities of opera as a medium. I welcome you to this production of The Riders, as an expression of our commitment to, and our embrace of, the Australian operatic story. Brad Cohen ARTISTIC DIRECTOR West Australian Opera

General Manager’s Message

We are thrilled to present the award winning new work The Riders, based on the novel by Tim Winton.

West Australian Opera is pleased to bring this award winning production to Western Australia.

We welcome composer Iain Grandage, director Marion Potts and musician Genevieve Lacey performing with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra. On behalf of the company I thank the creative team and artists for bringing this production to the stage for the first time in Western Australia.

Chairman’s Message

Opera is a beautiful but expensive art form and we value the support of our sponsors, patrons, donors, board and our audiences. Subscribers play an important role with West Australian Opera and I encourage you to subscribe to the 2016 season. I acknowledge Principal Partner Wesfarmers Arts, Major Partner Healthway, Civic Partner the City of Perth, Official Airline Partner Qantas, Conductor Partner NAB and Media Partners Channel Seven Perth and The West Australian. We are grateful for the continued support of the Federal Government through the Australia Council and the State Government through the Department of Culture and the Arts and Lotterywest. Terry Bowen CHAIRMAN West Australian Opera

This production was first staged by Victorian Opera as a co-production with Malthouse Theatre, commissioned with the support of the Robert Salzer Foundation and Victorian Opera New Work Syndicate. Enriching the cultural landscape through presenting high quality opera is at the heart of what we do. We believe it is important to support and explore new works in order to allow our art form to continue to evolve. The Riders has unique ties to WA, with Marion Potts' production adapted from the novel of treasured West Australian author Tim Winton. We are proud to welcome award winning composer, Iain Grandage, home to Perth for this exciting premiere. We are pleased to be able to share this new work with you, our audience, and showcase the talent of Australian artists. The Riders explores loss, longing and acceptance in a distinctly Australian voice and shares the very personal and spiritual journey of a man and his daughter. Welcome to The Riders. Carolyn Chard GENERAL MANAGER West Australian Opera

Iain Grandage

Alison Croggon

Brad Cohen

Iain Grandage composes, conducts and performs, and is the Artistic Director of the Port Fairy Spring Music Festival.

Alison Croggon is a poet, novelist, librettist and critic. Her work in all these areas has won or been shortlisted for numerous literary prizes, including four Premier’s Literary Awards, and she was the 2009 Geraldine Pascall Critic of the Year.

Brad was appointed Artistic Director of WAO in 2015, and has conducted Faust at HMT and most recently Gianni Schicchi for Opera in the Park. Other works for WAO which he has conducted are Carmen, Lucia di Lammermoor and The Magic Flute. Brad first came to public attention when, a year after winning the 1994 Leeds Conductor’s Competition, he conducted the world premiere of Thomas Adès’ Powder her Face.

Composer

As music director, he has won Helpmann Awards for his work with Meow Meow on the Malthouse/Sydney Festival production Little Match Girl, with the cast on Sydney Theatre Company’s The Secret River, and his collaboration with Kate Miller-Heidke on the new Australian opera, The Rabbits. His compositions for the theatre include Helpmann Award winning scores for Cloudstreet, When Time Stops and The Secret River, and Green Room Award winning scores for Lawn, In the Next Room, Babes in the Wood, The Odyssey and The Blue Room for theatre companies including Belvoir, Black Swan, Malthouse, MTC and STC. His first opera, based on Tim Winton’s The Riders premiered to great critical and audience acclaim in Melbourne in 2014 and recently won both the Green Room Award for Best New Australian Opera and the APRA/ AMC award for Vocal Work of the Year 2015.

Librettist

Her seven published novels include The River and the Book, released internationally last year, and The Bone Queen, the latest in her series The Books of Pellinor, released in 2016/2017. She is presently working on a new two book epic fantasy, Dreamers of the Absolute. She has written numerous libretti, notably for Michael Smetanin (The Burrow, Guaguin, Mayakovsky) and Iain Grandage (The Riders). In 2015 she was awarded a two year Australia Council Fellowship. Alison is a performance critic for ABC Arts Online and also reviews for Guardian Australia. She is a regular columnist and poetry critic for Overland magazine and is founding editor of the literary arts journal Masthead.

Conductor

Since that auspicious beginning he has conducted a wide ranging repertoire at English National Opera, New York City Opera, Opera Australia, Opera North, opera companies including Luzern, Nantes/Angers, Nederlands Reisopera, and at festivals including Edinburgh, Cheltenham, Adelaide, Hong Kong, Rossini in Wildbad. Most recently, a concert with Melbourne Symphony, Otello with State Opera of SA, Stiffelio at London’s South Bank with Chelsea Opera Group and Flight with Opera Holland Park. As an important complement to his performing career, Brad has an active role as an editor and publisher of Urtext operatic editions.

Marion Potts

Dale Ferguson

Matt Scott

Marion is a theatre director, dramaturg and translator. She has held Artistic Directorships at both Bell Shakespeare (Associate AD) and Malthouse Theatre (AD/CEO) and was Resident Director with Sydney Theatre Company (1995 – 1999).

Dale graduated from NIDA in 1989 and has worked extensively with major theatre and opera companies around the world.

Matt returns to WAO having previously lit La Boheme and La Sonnambula for the company.

Director

For Malthouse Theatre Marion has directed: The Dragon, Hate, Wild Surmise, Blood Wedding, Meow Meow’s Little Match Girl (and its London season at the Southbank Centre), ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore, Sappho... in 9 fragments, Venus & Adonis and its subsequent season at Auckland Festival (with Bell Shakespeare), and most recently The Riders (with Victorian Opera) and Ugly Mugs (with Griffin).

Set and Costume Designer

For Western Australian Opera Dale’s credits include: Marriage of Figaro (Opera Australia and Welsh National Opera) and Otello.(Cape Town Opera and Queensland Opera), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Houston Grand Opera, Canadian Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago), Ariadne auf Naxos (Welsh National Opera, Boston Lyric Opera and Canadian Opera), Eugene Onegin and Anything Goes (Opera Australia).

Recent theatre credits include; The Blind Giant is Dancing, Marion was the Helpmann Night on Bald Mountain, The recipient for Best Direction of a Weir, Dance of Death, Exit the Play in 2006 (The Goat or who King and August: Osage Country is Sylvia?). which received the Helpmann Award for Best Design and She was a founding Artistic Directorate member of Hothouse received four Green Room Awards for design. Theatre, a Board member of Windmill Theatre, the curator of He was also nominated for a the 2003 National Playwrights’ Drama Desk Award and two Conference, the Chairperson of Tony Awards in 2009 for set and World Interplay and a member of costume design for the Broadway the Theatre Board of the Australia adaption of Exit the King. Council.

Lighting Designer

For the past 21 years Matt has lit over 200 productions for theatre, opera and dance. His most recent work includes The Pearlfishers, Rigoletto and Don Pasquale for Opera Australia; Aida Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour; Banquet of Secrets, Voyage to the Moon, The Flying Dutchman, The Riders and Nixon in China for Victorian Opera; The Magic Flute for OzOpera; Last Man Standing, The Weir and Jumpy for Melbourne Theatre Company; The Red Shoes for Expression Dance Company; La Traviata and Madame Butterfly for SOSA and NZ Opera; As You Like It and A Streetcar Named Desire for Black Swan State Theatre. He has been nominated for and received numerous awards. He received a 2005 Helpmann Award for his lighting on Urinetown for Melbourne Theatre Company which followed his 2003 Helpmann Award win for The Blue Room, also for the Melbourne Theatre Company.

Guy Smith

Genevieve Lacey

James Clayton

Guy Smith is one of Australia’s most experienced and in demand sound professionals. He has engaged in Opera, Classical, Rock, Jazz, Vocal, Orchestral, Theatre and New Music.

Genevieve Lacey is a recorder virtuoso, serial collaborator and artistic director. She has a significant recording catalogue and an international career as a soloist. Genevieve has created a substantial body of large-scale collaborative works and has premiered scores of new works, written for her.

Praised for his vocal phrasing and colour, James Clayton is one the most versatile singers to emerge from Australia in recent years.

Sound Designer

Guy’s design experience is wide ranging from large scale outdoor orchestral events to television, opera and theatre. This skill set and experience has led to an ongoing and extensive international touring calendar as well as the design of sound systems for theatres and themed entertainment venues in China, Bangkok, Singapore and Australia. Recent work engagements include supervising the sound design for the centenary of the Anzacs celebration in Albany with WASO, The Waifs, Katie Noonan and Dan Sultan. Guy has worked on the Perth International Arts Festival’s opening event, Home, featuring Tim Minchin, WASO and a host of local acts including The Panics, The Waifs, John Butler and The Triffids.

Recorders

Her wide-ranging musical interests have seen her playing for the Queen in Westminster Abbey, representing Australian culture with a performance at the Lindau International Convention of Nobel Laureates, playing as a concerto soloist in the Proms, making music in a prison in the Pilbara, on an oval on Thursday Island alongside indigenous colleagues, and at the opening night of the London Jazz Festival. Genevieve’s has won her multiple awards including two ARIAs, a Helpmann award, Australia Council, Freedman and Churchill Fellowships and Outstanding Musician, Melbourne Prize for Music. She holds academic and performance degrees (including a doctorate) in music and English literature from universities in Melbourne, Switzerland and Denmark

Scully

In 2016, he sings Tonio (Pagliacci) for Victorian Opera and The Speaker (The Magic Flute) for New Zealand Opera – he also appears as soloist with the Melbourne and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras. Most recently, he has sung Escamillo in Carmen for Opera Australia and several roles for West Australian Opera – the title roles in Rigoletto, Le nozze di Figaro and Il barbiere di Siviglia, Leporello in Don Giovanni, Iago in Otello and Conte di Luna in Il trovatore. James made his Opera Australia debut as Baron Douphol in La traviata – in Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour – and his Japanese debut as Don Alfonso in Cosi fan tutte for Biwako Hall. He has appeared as soloist with the West Australian, Tasmanian and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras, the Auckland Philharmonia and the Wellington Orchestra.

Emma Pearson

Mia Beattie

Rosanna Radici

Principal artist at the Hessisches Staatstheater, Wiesbaden from 2005-2014, Emma’s repertoire included the title roles in Lucia di Lammermoor, Lulu and La Calisto; Queen of the Night (Die Zauberflöte), Zerbinetta (Ariadne auf Naxos), Jenny (The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny), Nanetta (Falstaff), Woglinde, Gerhilde and Waldvogel (Wagner’s Ring Cycle), Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier), and Norina (Don Pasquale). On departing she was the youngest singer to be awarded the honorary title of “Kammersängerin”.

Mia commenced performing at a young age with The Perth Youth Theatre where she had the opportunity to sing and dance in numerous musical theatre productions. Mia also received further musical theatre training at Ali Roberts Studio.

Rosanna Radici is a year 10 student at Methodist Ladies College, and is joyfully immersed in the wonderful music program at her school. She is currently a soprano with the Chorale and Combined Choir.

Jennifer

Recent engagements include Violetta (La Traviata) Opera Queensland; Gilda (Rigoletto) for NBR New Zealand Opera, Theater St Gallen and Staatstheater Saarbrücken; Clorinda (La cenerentola) Semperoper Dresden; Sophie for Opera Australia, Minneapolis and Valencia; Hilda Mack in Henze ‘s Elegy for Young Lovers and title role of La Calisto in Wiesbaden; Nanetta (Falstaff) in Nationaltheater Mannheim and Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro) for WA Opera. Emma has been a finalist in many international awards including the Australian Singing Competition‘s Marianne Mathy Scholarship.

Billie

She currently receives voice training from Perth jazz singer Libby Hammer and in 2015 won the under 15 Musical Theatre solo prize in the Southern Suburbs Music Society Eisteddfod. Mia attends Methodist Ladies College where she has sung in the Cantabile, played violin in the Philharmonic orchestra, performed in the 2015 production of Beauty and The Beast and currently sings in the Chorale and Barbershop ensembles. Mia has learnt ballet and jazz ballet from an early age and currently performs with the WA Performance School, most recently singing and dancing at the Perth Fringe Festival.

Billie

In 2014 Rosanna travelled to Vienna for the Summa Cum Laude International Youth Music Festival, and then to Riga to participate in the World Choir Games. Rosanna plays several musical instruments, including the piano and clarinet, and this year has also started learning the saxophone. She studies drama at school and has participated in a number of school productions. Rosanna loves all music styles, from classical to contemporary. The Riders is her debut with West Australian Opera.

Wade Kernot

Fiona Campbell

Matthew Lester

Principal artist at Theater St Gallen, Switzerland, from 2010 - 2015, Wade’s roles included Monterone (Rigoletto), the Forester (The Cunning Little Vixen), Osmin (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), Zuniga, Père Laurent (Roméo et Juliette), Gubetta (Lucrezia Borgia), Jacopo Loredano (I due Foscari), Wotan (Siegfried), Truffaldino, Il Pedone di Schnals (La Wally), Commendatore (Don Giovanni), Melisso (Alcina), Méphistophélès (La Damnation de Faust), Sarastro, Sprecher, Erster Priester & Zweiter Geharnischter (Die Zauberflöte), Sam (Un Ballo in Maschera), the main bass roles in Purcell’s The Fairy Queen, Frank (Die Fledermaus) Comte des Grieux, 1st Nazarene (Salome), and Handwerkbursche (Wozzeck).

Fiona Campbell is one of Australia’s most versatile and beloved classical singers a producer and guest ABC presenter, accomplished international performer, recitalist and recording artist.

Matthew Lester is a Perth based tenor who has performed a variety of minor principal roles for West Australian Opera and has been a member of the Chorus since 1999.

Arthur

This year, engagements include the role of Fred in a new work by Ross Harris (libretto by Vincent O’Sullivan), Brass Poppies, for New Zealand Festival, the title role in The Marriage of Figaro with Opera Australia Tour, Sarastro for New Zealand Opera, and he will return to WAO to sing Nourabad in The Pearl Fishers.

Marianne

She was the winner of the national Limelight Award for Best Solo Performance 2011 (with the ABO in their Haunting Handel concert series), vocal winner of the ABC Young Performer of the Year Award and the ASC Opera Awards. Fiona sings regularly as a principal artist with all of the major ensembles and orchestras in Australia; her international collaborators have included the Brodsky Quartet, Tokyo Philharmonic, Manchester Camerata, Hong Kong Philharmonic and many others. During 2015, Fiona appeared as soloist with the Sydney Symphony, Melbourne Symphony, Auckland Philharmonia and for Musica Viva in Munich; she also sang major roles in The Barber of Seville, The Marriage of Figaro and Faust for West Australian Opera.

Alex

Since 2013 he has performed as Parpignol in La Boheme, Roderigo in Otello, Spoletta in Tosca, Ruiz in Il Travatore, Goro in Butterfly and Gherardo in Gianni Schicci. When not performing for WA Opera, Matthew works in WA Health in the area of Public Health. His workplace is very accommodating toward his opera pursuits and his work colleagues have developed a strong tolerance to sudden outbursts of song. Matthew is married to a criminal defence lawyer and has four daughters whose upbringing has been enriched by regular exposure to opera.

Program Notes “Novels are not natural fits for opera: You have to transform 100,000 words into something like 5,000 words or less, and it has to be a text that will make sense on a stage with music…it can’t just be a novel with songs, it has to stand on its own terms.” Alison Croggon

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The transformation of a fictional work into opera requires specific skills. It also poses certain questions for both librettist and composer: What to focus on in the dramatic idiom? What to leave out or elide? Compression is paramount.

Winton’s picaresque novel encompasses many European destinations, as well as Perth WA. His protagonists, Fred Scully and his seven year old daughter Billie are searching for the elusive Jennifer, the missing wife/mother, who leads them on a nightmarish odyssey from Ireland, to Greece, Amsterdam and Paris before they finally return back to Ireland. In operatic terms, however, Jennifer becomes a real presence: A veritable femme fatale.There is no physical contact with her husband and daughter, but her voice (coloratura soprano) is heard in solo, duet and ensemble as their quest progresses. The opera’s Prologue, set to Patrick Kavanagh’s poem On Raglan Road says it all

“On Raglan Road on an autumn day I met her first and knew That her dark hair would weave a snare that I might one day rue; I saw the danger, yet I walked along the enchanted way, And I said, let grief be a fallen leaf at the dawning of the day.”

Scully (baritone) is the man she snares, and he’s consumed with desolation and jealousy as he searches for her. They have scenes in which both sing, but not as a traditional operatic duet; their interaction is at a dream level. “Because I loved her” is Scully’s recurring theme. Arguably Scully can be seen as the most finely drawn character in both novel and opera. Composer Iain Grandage says “One of Tim

Winton’s great gifts is to give voice to people [like Scully] who otherwise might seem unknowable. He helps us understand their emotional landscape [or soundscape] and how we might interact with them.” Billie, the daughter, has been forced to grow up in a hurry. She is the most clear sighted of them all, as the aging Greek artist, Alex, tells her: “You’re older than your old man. You’re wiser than your father. I see it in your eyes.” Billie sees everything. She loves her mother, the elusive Jennifer, but knows that they are all teetering on the edge, and images of falling, both vocally and orchestrally, are inscribed in descending scale passages. Tritones, the diabolus in musica (the devil in music) also aptly describe the mayhem the fruitless search for Jennifer is causing. The eponymous Riders infiltrate both novel and opera. Orchestrally their recurring motif of rhythmic galloping is initially heard in Act 1 set in Ireland. Scully is waiting for his wife and daughter to arrive from Perth, and is drawn to the sound of horses galloping around the nearby castle: “Or is it my own heart beating?” he sings. Shadows of riders wheel about the stage. Jennifer does not return and finally Scully and Billie return to Ireland. Their search is ended and, unlike the mythical Riders, Scully has learnt to let go of the past, singing: “I know them like I know my own heart. But I’m not waiting for them, not in life, not in death, not anymore. Not anymore.” The stars become brighter as the horsemen slowly disappear.

Annie Patrick

Photograph by James Rogers of Milica Ilic (The Magic Flute, West Australian Opera)

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Family,

Robert

Larbalestier, Joyce Westrip OAM, Anonymous (1) BENEFACTOR ($2,500 - $4,999) Neil Archibald & Alan R Dodge AM, Dr Bryant Macfie, Neil & Annie Patrick, Anonymous (1) SUPPORTER ($1,000 - $2,499) Her Excellency The Honourable Kerry Sanderson AO, Mrs Gaysie Atkinson, Cathy Bardon & Bob Cassie, Betty Barker, Peter Blaxell, Dr and Mrs Breidahl, Mrs Jennifer Brukner, Mrs Joan Carney, Helen Carroll, Helen Cook, Lorraine Ellard, Catherine Ferrari, Erich Fraunschiel, Dr Dennis Hayward, Kathryn Hogan and Graham Droppert, Francis & Suzette Landels, Patrick Lilburne, Richard Noble & Co, Max & Susan Page, Dr Peter Simpson OAM, Tri & Christina Suseno, Mrs Elizabeth Syme, Dana Trtica, Peter Wheatley – The Late Mrs Robin Wheatly, Anonymous (1) FRIEND ($200 - $999) Ian & Kerry Adams, Harry Anstey, Mr David Black, Henry Boston, Robert Branchi, Peter Briggs, Lynne Buzzard, Mary Carr, Dr Charlene Caspersz, Carolyn Chard, Tony & Sheila Cockbain, Carol Crabb, Mr Christopher Edge, Mrs Shirley Egan, Mr John Evans, Mr Noel French, Friends of His Majesty’s Theatre, Isobel Glencross, Mindy Green & Stephen McDonald, P & A Hawkins, Dr Penny Herbert, Ian & Sue Hobson, Professor Lynne Hunt, Margaret Jarman, Norma & Max Kay AM CitWA, Jennie Kennedy, Suzette Landels, Rosalind Lilley, Jill Lowes, Dr Toby Manford, Jennifer Marshall, Mr Anthony Munro, Mr Robert Nicolson, Ms Celia Patterson, Jerry Pinnow, Jennifer Rankin, Len & Sue Roberts-Smith, Rosalin Sadler, Peter Shannon, Lindsay & Suzanne Silbert, Dr Maureen Smith, Dr Louise Sparrow, Mrs Alison Stevens, Alan & Jan Stewart, Elizabeth Syme, John & Antoinette Tate, Mrs Janet Thackray, Grady Venville, Diana Warnock OAM, Joy Wearne, Olive Wheeler-Brennan, Peter & Hilary Winterton, Mature Adults Learning Association, Anonymous (16) ANDREW AND NICOLA FORREST The generous gift of FMG shares is testament to the Forrest’s commitment to a strong and vibrant arts sector in Western Australia. We acknowledge the Minderoo Foundation. TRUSTS AND FOUNDATIONS Bendat Family Foundation, Minderoo Foundation, Stan Perron Charitable Trust, Tuite Family Foundation, Wright Burt Foundation YOUNG ARTIST PROGRAM The Bendat Scholarship, Mr Andrew Mitchell, The Society of WA Opera Lovers, The James Galvin Family Foundation BELCANTO FUND Thanks to the leadership donors of the Belcanto Fund BEQUEST CIRCLE Ailsa West, Anita & James Clayton, Anonymous (1)

WAO BOARD

WAO STAFF

WASO ON STAGE TONIGHT

Chairman Terry Bowen

General Manager Carolyn Chard

Deputy Chairs Catherine Ferrari Andrew Pascoe

Artistic Director Brad Cohen

VIOLIN Assoc Concertmaster Graeme Norris Principal 2nd Violin Zak Rowntree*

Board Directors Julian Burt Mario D’Orazio Warwick Hemsley Ingrid O’Brien Jan Stewart PATRONS Dr Jack Bendat AM CitWA Cav Uff Giuseppe Bertinazzo OMRI

Production Manager Mandy Farmer Development Manager Coralie Bishop Artistic Administrator Rebecca Kais Accountant Debbie Liebgott Education Manager Terasa Letizia

VICE REGAL PATRON Her Excellency the Honourable Kerry Sanderson AO Governor of Western Australia

Marketing Coordinator Danielle Ierace

HONORARY LIFE MEMBERS Dario Amara Cav Uff Giuseppe Bertinazzo OMRI Hon Julie Bishop MP Frank Cooper Erich Fraunschiel Colin Goddard Francis Landels Margaret McManus Dr Richard Mills AM Marilyn Phillips Vincent A Warrener AM KHS

Publicity Lynne Burford

PERTH THEATRE TRUST Chairman Morgan Solomon Trustee Cr Jim Adamos Trustee Max Kay Trustee Michelle Tremain Trustee Cr Janet Davidson Ex-Officio Duncan Ord

HIS MAJESTY’S THEATRE Manager Helen Stewart Assistant Manager James Nerva Technical Manager Ian Studham Assistant Technical Manager Tony Gordon Event Ops Coordinator Alexandra MacNish Accounts Assistant Jenny May Administration Assistant Julianna Noonan Stage Door Keeper Narda McMahon Box Office Supervisor Jenny Franklin Archivist Ivan King Head Mechanist Bryce Goddard Head Lighting Matthew Nankivell

Office Coordinator Marion O’Connor

Financial Accountant Sue Hobson Sales Consultant Rachel Sait Regional Projects Manager Melanie Timms Music Librarian Allison Fyfe

VIOLA Alex Brogan CELLO Rod McGrath DOUBLEBASS Andrew Sinclair* BASS CLARINET Alexander Millier HORN David Evans TRUMPET Brent Grapes BASS TROMBONE Philip Holdsworth PERCUSSION Brian Maloney Principal Percussion PIANO Tommaso Pollio^ GUITAR Duncan Gardiner^ ACCORDIAN/SAMPLER Cathy Travers^ * Instruments used by these musicians are on loan from Janet Holmes à Court AC.

Revolve courtesy Black Swan State Theatre Company Horses and gantry built by Plumb The Federation Handbells are managed by Museum Victoria on behalf of Creative Victoria Iain Grandage acknowledges the support of: Neil Armfield Humphrey Bower Jenny Darling Josh Hoga Janet Holmes à Court Melanie Robinson UWA School of Music

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