Guildhall questions: Timothy Redmond answers

Guildhall School's upcoming Opera Double Bill, taking place in Silk Street Theatre from 5–12 June, offers audiences the opportunity to enjoy two rarely performed British chamber operas: Holst's Sāvitri and Judith Weir's Blond Eckbert. This production of these two imaginative and haunting works is directed by Ashley Dean and conducted by Timothy Redmond.

Timothy Redmond is Professor of Conducting at Guildhall School, a regular guest conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and conductor and co-creator of the Royal Albert Hall’s My Great Orchestral Adventure™ concert series.

We caught up with Timothy in between rehearsals to hear more about the two works featuring in this double bill, what it's been like to work on the production and his special family connection with one of the pieces.

Could you give a brief introduction to the chamber operas being performed in this double bill? 

At the very end of the 19th century, when Holst was in his mid-twenties, he became absolutely fascinated by the ancient Hindu text, the Rigveda. Such was his interest, that he taught himself Sanskrit in order to make his own translations of the stories he was reading and subsequently set those words to music.

The legend of Sāvitri and Satyavan is found in the Sanskrit epic poem, the Mahābhārata. It tells the tale of a woman, Sāvitri, who confronts Death and entreats him to spare her husband Satyavan. Her heartfelt declaration of love for her husband moves Death and he allows Satyavan to return to the land of the living. 

In his operatic setting of 1909, Holst alternates a spare folk-like simplicity with an opulent and lush sound world that wouldn’t be out of place in the music of Strauss or Wagner. He writes in a strikingly original manner, foreshadowing what we might expect to hear from Benjamin Britten several decades later. For example, Sāvitri and Death sing in unaccompanied counterpoint for the entire first page of the opera and later a wordless choir of female voices represents Maya – illusion – creating an otherworldly sound that Holst would go on to use in Neptune, the final movement of The Planets. 

Sāvitri is an extraordinary work, ahead of its time in many respects, but which was received with great enthusiasm when it was first performed and which has found a justified place in the repertoire.

Judith Weir, one of Britain’s most respected and prolific operatic composers, wrote Blond Eckbert for the English National Opera in 1993. That original score, for large orchestra and chorus as well as solo voices, was reworked into a chamber version in 2006 and it’s this that we’ll be performing in June. The story concerns a man and his wife, a mysterious friend, and a bird, who both observes and narrates and goes on to philosophise about the loneliness one can feel in the forest: ‘Alone in a wood, I don't feel so good’. Based on Ludwig Tieck’s Der blonde Eckbert of 1796, it has its literary roots in German Romantic fairy tales. But unlike the happy-ever-afters of Disney’s fairytale endings, this narrative unfolds in unexpected ways and the relationship between the characters becomes both supernatural and alarming.

Weir’s music is punchy and pungent, jazz-flecked and constantly shifting underfoot. It does what all great operatic scores do, offering a subconscious to the drama and leaving space between the sung words for the listener to interpret the story as they perceive it.

What can audiences expect from this production?

One-act operas, like short stories, have to introduce their characters and develop their narratives very efficiently. Sāvitri (30 minutes) and Blond Eckbert (60 minutes) are satisfyingly succinct and offer the audience a compelling pair of musical stories in the vein of Roald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected. Shared archetypal themes of love and death, nature and fate and the complexities of human relationships underpin the evening’s drama and the designs of the two operas share elements which underline their common threads.

You have a family connection with one of the pieces – could you tell us more?

I was doing some research into early performances of Sāvitri and by chance discovered that exactly 100 years ago my grandfather sang the role of Death! I knew he had sung in the premiere of another opera of Holst’s (The Perfect Fool) but I hadn’t realised the two operas were sung as a double bill in a tour by the British National Opera Company in 1923. That autumn the company toured Scotland for five weeks, presenting eight shows a week of a total of 18 different operas (quite an extraordinary thought) amongst them several new works by British composers which were a great success, with The Scotsman commenting "There has been nothing more gratifying in connection with the present brilliant little season of opera at the King's Theatre than the success which has attended the performance of the four works by British composers included in the season's repertory”. As a conductor of new music, it gives me great pleasure to know that the audiences of 100 years ago were so welcoming to new opera!

What’s it been like to work with Guildhall artists on this project?

The extraordinary thing about working at Guildhall is being surrounded by so many fabulously talented young people in such a broad range of disciplines. The opera school itself is a thing of wonder, comprising singers on the cusp of their careers. If you don’t catch them today, they’ll be on the international stage before you can blink. But opera being opera, every theatrical element is represented, and so one gets to witness the invention, dedication and artistry of stage managers and crew, lighting and sound teams, set and costume designers and make-up artists, not to mention the impressive virtuosity of the orchestral musicians in the pit. Overseen by the most supportive of staff, it is both inspiring and humbling to see so many young people working together in such a professional way.

Who or what have been some of the biggest inspirations in your career?

To be in music is to spend your whole life learning. We spend our every moment aspiring to do something that can never be fully mastered in performances that by their very nature can never be repeated. And so, to witness people who have dedicated their lives to this art and who have an ability to tell a story through music is the biggest inspiration. Recording with Alison Balsom and working with Simon Keenlyside, assisting Thomas Adès and conducting concerts with the LSO are all things that have influenced me profoundly. But so too was playing in my youth orchestra when I was a teenager. And I wouldn’t be where I am today without that experience then.

What is your top tip for aspiring young opera singers?

Keep learning, keep listening, keep asking. And always aim to be the kind of colleague you’d like to work with.

Performances of Guildhall School's Opera Double Bill: Sāvitri & Blond Eckbert take place at 7pm on 5, 7, 9 & 12 June 2023 in Silk Street Theatre. Tickets available here.