Opera

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, I was going to start by saying that I am very keen on opera, because I thought that might be quite an original way to start, but it turns out that I am not alone. It seems that everybody in this Chamber is, and that is very heartening.

I agree with those who said that, at its best, opera is the most complete and satisfying form of theatre ever imagined. I make no apology for saying that and believing it. It has given me some of the most exhilarating experiences of my life, as clearly it has to the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. I have also been close to the business of opera, as indeed he has, over the years in executive and non-executive roles, including as a member of the board of WNO and briefly, as the noble Lord knows, as chief executive of the Royal Opera House.

I have been involved with conservatoire training and seen at close quarters what it takes to acquire the skills needed to perform opera. My daughter is a professional opera singer and has been for 20 years. She is now also the artistic director and chief executive of OperaUpClose, to which I will return, a national touring company based in Southampton and included since 2023 in ACE’s national portfolio.

So I know something about the art form and something about the sector. But what I mostly am—to go back to my original point—and always have been, is a fan of opera in all its guises, and it is the variety of those guises that I want to touch on. I have loved and admired our big opera companies all my life. We have been told who they are. I would add to the four that have been mentioned by my noble friend Lord Murphy Glyndebourne and Scottish Opera. I know it does not fall within the purview of Arts Council England; none the less, it is part of the ecosystem, to which I will also return.

I am very dismayed by what has happened recently. My views about Arts Council England and the decisions it has taken recently are on the record and I am not going to repeat them. Over the years, these big companies have expanded what they do beyond their wonderful productions to encompass education, outreach, training and much else besides—as we have heard. They are also key local employers. Their work is crucial and they are right to deploy their formidable advocacy skills to defend their interests.

However, in supporting such companies, we must not forget that they are not the whole story and that what they do is not everything that opera can be—that is despite what the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, said; I hesitate to disagree with him, but I do. They are part, as I know they would readily acknowledge, of a complex, wide-ranging ecosystem, largely reliant not on long-term employees but on an army of freelancers. The vital innovation that will keep opera alive for the future happens across the whole of that ecosystem. All of it needs support in these very challenging times.

OperaUpClose is a good example. It is a small but ambitious company, where emerging composers, singers, conductors, directors, designers and technicians can test their ideas and learn their craft, and where established practitioners can do things differently. OperaUpClose actively chooses to perform in smaller spaces and places where opera is rarely available. It engages with local communities, inviting them to contribute directly to the creation of work. It runs important early career training opportunities and commissions work for very young audiences. If you have never been in a room with a bunch of very young children—three and four-year-olds—watching a man dressed as a teddy bear talking about not being able to get to sleep, then you have not heard “Peace At Last”, and you have not lived. All of this is delivered by a tiny team, with tiny budgets, competing for diminishing resources in an increasingly tough funding environment.

Yet there is nothing second best or reductive about what companies such as OperaUpClose are doing. High musical standards and production values are at the heart of their work; they extend the boundaries of what opera can be and the impact it can have. Doing that depends on a workforce that is almost all freelance, and as skilled and extraordinary as you will see in any grand opera house—and indeed many of them are the same people.

When we talk about supporting opera, we must talk about supporting the whole sector, at all scales and iterations; otherwise the whole sector will wither and ultimately die, as we have already been warned this evening. I believe that opera, no matter where or at what scale it is performed, is a living, breathing, evolving art form, with a unique ability, as we have also heard, to stir our most deep-seated emotions of joy, anguish, longing and acceptance. That is why it is important. I say to my noble friend the Minister when she comes to reply that opera speaks in many voices—let us make sure we are listening to all of them.