Opera chiefs launch post-curtain assault on Arts Council
OperaPeter Grimes opened last night at Welsh National Opera in Cardiff. Nicky Spence was Grimes, Sally Matthews sang Ellen Orford, Sarah Connolly was Auntie and Catherine Wyn-Rogers was Mrs Sedley. The chorus, we are told, ‘sang like demons’. The conductor was music director Tomáš Hanus.
Amid the curtain calls, WNO’s co-CEOs Sarah Crabtree and Adele Thomas, came on stage and made a long, scripted speech about the company’s plight after cuts by Arts Council England, describiung the assault on the arts in this country as a ‘threat to democracy’.
The speech was greeted with vociferous applause. We’d like to publish the script.
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