Today at RNCM we have started production rehearsals for our scene of Mitridate Re di Ponto, an opera that Mozart wrote when he was 13(!). The plot is basically about two brothers (Sifare and Farnace) who are both in love with their father Mitridate’s fiance (Aspasia), and who think he has died at war. Aspasia quite likes Sifare but she does not like Farnace. Sifare tries to be loyal to his brother and to his father but deep down he really loves Aspasia. Farnace decides to betray them all to the Romans before ultimately confessing the error of his ways. The extract we are doing has me singing Farnace’s first aria, the 8 minute long beast “Venga Pur”. In it Farnace is basically ranting about his father, saying “let him come and find me, see if I care”. I suppose daddy issues are something the 13 year old Mozart knew well.

I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve been selected to take part in Creative Juices. This is a new enterprise funded by the Genesis Foundation, and run by Caroline Clegg, Emma Jenkins and Sir David Pountney. We’ll be working on developing short operatic “scenas” for presentation in October. It’s a fantastic opportunity to be involved in the creation of new work from the beginning — before the libretto has even been written. I can’t wait to see how the pieces develop.