Opera and Musical Theatre

Meeting librettist Sue Curtis in 2007 resulted in a heavy shift towards Opera and Musical Theatre.  Collaborating with her on Vice was my first experience of composing for the stage.  This lead on to performances and workshops at the Arcola Theatre and Soho Theatre, as well as a workshop at Birkbeck College.  Our second stage show, a short opera called Demon Lover, went into production at the Arcola Theatre. We have lectured on the process of turning a short story into an opera at the University of North Carolina and Arcadia University for the last 7 years.

As a performer, I have been in two National Theatre productions with Olivier Award winning director Sally Cookson. Jane Eyre was on at the Littleton Theatre over Christmas 2015. I sang, played piano, cello, flute, percussion, double bass and accordion in the show. Peter Pan opened the Troubadour White City Theatre in 2019.  I acted, sang, and played instruments throughout the show. For both of these shows I played a vital role in the story telling, accompanying the main cast on piano both in song and behind their dialog.

Through all this experience working in Opera and Musical Theatre I have explored how to use music to tell a story sympathetically through the use of singing and instrumentation.