Song of the Dove

A new opera is a major undertaking for any company and one of the challenges is that staff responsible for raising money, enticing audiences and selling tickets can’t know exactly what they’re dealing with in advance. No handy recording to listen to, no DVD of a previous production to slip into their laptops. The problem is pretty much solved when a composer is as obliging, skilled and entertaining as Jonathan Dove. Yesterday afternoon in Leeds he treated key members of the Opera North team to a bravura one-man show, playing and singing through the entire score of his new opera Pinocchio (with a brilliantly lucid and witty text by Alasdair Middleton). There was one mishap, when Dove tried to sneak a slug of water with one hand while continuing to play with the other and succeeded in drenching both himself and the keyboard, but he kept going, singing the role of the Cricket one minute, Pinocchio the next and the Blue Fairy the next. Sensational stuff, and with a full cast it will be even better. Performances start this December.