Celebration of Henry Purcell’s works to be staged in Wolverhampton
A stage show celebrating Henry Purcell widely regarded as the greatest stage composer of his age will be performed in Wolverhampton.
BAFTA-nominated director Nicholas Renton is set to join acclaimed music and theatre company The Telling to tour Clare Norburn’s play with music, Purcell, The Musical, at Arena Theatre, Wolverhampton, on Saturday, April 18.
The show traces the life, times and music of Purcell, who is described by playwright Clare Norburn as “the Andrew Lloyd Webber or Stephen Sondheim of his age”.
Clare Norburn, noted for her use of music within theatre, said: “Nobody wrote better music for the Restoration stage – and arguably, I’d go further and say Purcell was the greatest British born composer before Elgar too.”
She said that in the later years of Purcell’s short life, writing for the stage was his greatest passion, with works such as Dido and Aeneas being well known, though many of his stage songs were written for plays that are now rarely performed.
Clare Norburn has created a new dramatic framework for one of Purcell’s rarely performed works, A Dialogue Between Two Wives, originally part of The Canterbury Guests, re-imagining it as a quarrel between Purcell’s wife, Frances, and star singer Letitia Cross.
She said this approach gives modern audiences a chance to experience Purcell’s stage songs in a dramatic setting, “albeit radically reworked to tell the imagined story of Purcell’s personal life, about which we know nothing concrete.”
Purcell, The Musical is described as a ‘concertplay’, a hybrid of music and theatre set in 1695 as Purcell, played by Niall Ashdown, experiences feverish hallucinations in which his songs come to life and his bedroom becomes a theatre.
The play includes Purcell’s instrumental and vocal music, from bawdy theatre ballads and joyful celebrations to slow airs and songs from his semi-operas.
The cast features Niall Ashdown as Purcell, Sarah Lambie and Héloïse Bernard, Joanna Lawrence on violin, Miriam Nohl or Rachel Gray on cello, and Oliver-John Ruthven, Aidan Phillips or Jan Waterfield on harpsichord.
Tickets for the Wolverhampton show are available online at wlv.ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/shows/873679931.
