Output details

Yes - A new opera. Premiered at Linbury, Royal Opera House, London

Commissioned by the Royal Opera House 2 programme, this modern and experimental opera was a collaboration with writer Bonnie Greer. The opera focuses on the events that preceded Greer's appearance on BBC's Question Time with the leader of the British National Party, Nick Griffin, and the libretto was written and part-performed by Greer while I composed the music,

The opera featured a cast of nine singers, seven musicians and a soundscape. My task was not only to attempt to enter the writer's world but also to deal with the notion of a state-of-the-nation statement in a dramatic form. There were struggles to find a form that could contain and communicate the content effectively, but I was motivated not just by the content, but by the belief that opera is a form that should be accessible to all and can address all facets of contemporary life.

I drew on a range of musical styles and structures including reggae, gospel, and western classical music—and also referenced Arabic and Celtic music—in order to attempt to encapsulate the diversity of life in London and the UK. I was conscious that this opera was not typical of the ROH's usual repertoire and that the creative team of two black women was unprecedented. Nonetheless, my focus was on the role of music as a cultural and cross-cultural force that communicates widely. Greer and I shared a passionate commitment to communication and worked intensively together, partly as she had no previous experience of opera and the collaboration therefore required discussion at every step of the way.

The production raised issues about how words and music, the literal and the poetic, can coexist and how they should

inter-relate to find meaningful unity and/or provocative dissonance.