Regents Opera August 2026 newsletter
War Requiem, Elektra, Parsifal!
Greetings everyone from Berlin, where it’s a much more sensible temperature today!
Team Rigoletto have just got back from a wonderful week in France (I stayed behind and coached on the Berlin Opera Academy), and now we’re looking forward to some magnificent music-making over the next couple of months in London.
We can also now give you some important Parsifal announcements!
Firstly: WAR REQUIEM!
This year, following the success of our Strauss “Alpine” Symphony and Mahler’s “Resurrection” concerts the past two years, we are putting on a yet more enormous concert, this time at Croydon’s Fairfield Halls, of Britten’s remarkable, and indeed challenging War Requiem. This year is the 50th anniversary of the death of Benjamin Britten, and we thought this was an ideal moment to present this piece.
It will feature the Children of Dulwich Hamlet School, a massed adult choir taken from all across the UK, including members of the Civil Service Choir, Blackheath Chorale, Beckenham Chorale, Eclectic Voices, Midsummer Opera, The English Arts Chorale, and members of choirs from the Surrey Leith Hill Choirs Festival (one of which, I was once Music Director of) along with soloists Philippa Boyle, Andrew Tortise and Felix Kemp.
If you would like to sing in it, the rehearsal details are here, and please do drop me an email!
If you are a string player and would like to play in it, please email Alison.
But most importantly, to buy tickets, please do so on the button below.
Elektra at Blackheath Halls
In partnership with New Palace Opera, on Sunday 1st November at Blackheath Halls we will be giving a concert performance of Strauss’s bloodthirsty opera Elektra. Catharine Woodward, fresh from her success as Longborough’s Isolde, will be singing the title, along with Ella de Jongh as Chrysothemis, Karin Lovelius as Klytemnestra and Ashley Mercer as Orestes. Tickets are selling quickly - get yours before it’s too late!
…and the big Parsifal announcement…!
So, it is time to answer some of your questions! The Great Hall of the Guildhall wasn't going to work for a selection of reasons, not least cost, so we have spent many months in consultation with Sir David scouting various venues in London. We can now confirm that our Parsifal will take place at the Ironworks, nearest station Canning Town. Their website. This venue will allow us to create a production on a scale far beyond anything we’ve done before. This will be designed by one of Sir David's long-time collaborators, Robert Innes Hopkins, who famously designed his award-winning production of Die Soldaten, which was also in a big warehouse space...
The Ironworks in Canning Town, in a state you will not see it in!
You’ll be pleased to know, we have plans to help you get there, including the potential of a boat from the centre of London, which will be an exciting part of the experience as well.
We will do six performances over three weekends with two casts, opening on 10th September 2027, which happens to be Sir David's 80th birthday...
We plan for tickets to go on general sale in the 2nd week of October. We'll let you all know as soon as we can!
If, at this moment, you would like to make a donation to Parsifal (I'm afraid that yes, I will be asking....) then please do so here.
Again, the cast for that includes:
Kundry: Catharine Woodward / Catherine Backhouse
Gurnemanz: Henry Grant Kerswell / Simon Wilding
Parsifal: James Schouten / Peter Furlong
Amfortas: Ralf Lukas
Klingsor: Oliver Gibbs
and it will be in an orchestral arrangement by yours truly.
And finally, a big thank you to our friends at Big Yellow Storage in Fulham - thank you for taking care of all of our stuff!
Here’s to a great rest of the summer!