Guildford Opera Company
The company inherited
in 1991 by Peter White, then Director of Music at Guildford's Royal
Grammar School, was at its peak, performing regularly at Guildford's
Civic Hall with a range of exceptional soloists, many working
professionally with companies like ENO, Sadlers Wells and Scottish
National Opera. It also had its own company dancers under choreographer
Georgina Durelle and a talented back-stage crew. Its achievements
in this period were twice recognised with NODA awards - in 1992
for Die Fledermaus and 1996 for I Pagliacci - this in addition to
its programme for Merrie England (1975) being on permanent display in
the Enthoven Theatre Collection at the Victoria and Albert museum.
In 1997 the Electric
Theatre opened and GOC staged its first production there, Dido and
Aeneas, under the late Chris Findlay's direction. From then until the
closure of the Civic Hall in 2004 the company alternated between these
contrasting venues, augmenting its staged productions with concert
programmes at venues including the Marble Hall at Clandon Park, and
Chilworth Friary, as well as touring local villages.
The millennium found
GOC still ready and willing to take on new challenges, like the 20th
Century Opera Season of 2002, when MD Oliver Parker led the company in
Stuart Barker's bold production of Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress
alongside Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti and Walton's The Bear, both
critically acclaimed by The Times.
From Autumn 2003 to
Spring 2009 GOC was led by Kevin John, a fine tenor and pianist with an
impeccable professional background. The company continued to offer a
varied concert programme - from Rodgers and Hammerstein to Messiah
“sing-a-longs” - as well as an annual staged
production, to attract new members.
The present Director
of Music, Francis Griffin, is a graduate of the Royal College of Music
and has a strong orchestral background with a passion for opera.
He has worked extensively with operatic societies and orchestras
throughout England and Europe, notably White Horse Opera in Devizes,
has conducted in the South Bank and Barbican Centres, and has
collaborated particularly closely with local composer Joe St Johanser.
Following the
critically acclaimed production of Faust in November 2009, Francis is
looking forward to starting rehearsals for Lucia di Lammermoor on 28
April 2010.
GOC enjoys a lively
social programme, often harnessed to fundraising activities which in
recent years have helped provide supporting orchestras for its stage
productions. The success of GOC’s 35th anniversary production of Die Fledermaus in 2006
was complemented by sell-out performances of A Masked Ball in
2007, testament to the company’s continued place in the fore-front
of Guildford music-making.
To find out more about joining GOC, go to the membership page.
* NODA -
National Operatic
and Dramatic Association
* NODA -
About
Guildford Opera Company
began life in 1968 performing Gilbert and Sullivan as the Emmanuel
Players before formal constitution, first as Guildford Amateur Operatic
Society in 1971 and then as Guildford Opera Company (GOC) in 1975.
Over the next 20
years its reputation for excellence and innovation was established
under Musical Director John Avery, working with a variety of talented
producer/directors. These included Chris Bedloe with whom he adapted
the music and libretto for GOC's first full-scale opera, Carmen,
in 1975, Mavis Tanner, whose production of The Mikado in 1980 was GOC's
first “sell-out” production, and Paul Frecknall who
helped John achieve a long-cherished ambition to mount a Wagner
opera The Flying Dutchman in his penultimate year as MD.
GOC's success during
this period was due in no small part to the Women's Royal Auxiliary
Corp Staff Band with whom it joined forces in 1973, for the annual
Festival of Light Music concerts in aid of the Army Benevolent fund, an
association which continued until the Gulf War and subsequent defence
cuts led to disbandment in the early 1990s.
A scene from the 2008
production of Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore
