Opera company refuses to be silenced

The curtain that closed with heavy finality on the farewell performance by Gauteng Opera in March has been yanked back again for an encore as the feisty company refuses to be silenced.

Last minute donations and some requests to perform in retirement homes have kept the company afloat. But singing to the aged or the already converted won’t pay the bills for long, so Gauteng Opera recently staged a showcase dubbed ‘Opera For Everybody’ to encourage event organisers and companies to book them or sponsor them.

The slogan didn’t sound convincing. Opera For Everyone Except Me, I thought, as I entered Tin Town Theatre in grimy Ferreirasdorp where Gauteng Opera is based. Then they started to sing, and gave me goosebumps.

The singers were all trainees or interns except for artistic director Phenye Modiane, yet they sounded world class, and one of them, Solly Motaung, will join a company in London next year.

CEO Arnold Cloete says the company’s demise had always been staved off by ad hoc sponsorships or by performing for donations until the cash ran out completely. Then a few days after the official closure they regrouped for a concert at a retirement home. “We said we’re so desperate we’ll sing for anything, but R10,000 would at least pay the singers,” Cloete remembers. “That night we made R42,000 because people were really getting emotional. That started us singing in retirement centres and it’s basically saved us.”

More donations have allowed the trainees and interns to keep receiving daily lessons at Tin Town Theatre where they’re learning to become top-notch performers. Most are from disadvantage backgrounds and several come from poor Eastern Cape communities. They all earned their places through tough auditions, and receive a stipend towards living expenses.

Some are now being supported through one of the innovative fund-raising ideas devised by Cloete and Modiane. The Adopt An Artist scheme lets you pick your favourite performer and pay them R3,000 a month, so they can focus on their art rather than worry about the rent. The adoptee and a pianist will perform at an event of the sponsor’s choice, and the patron is invited to all their concerts.

They’ve also repackaged their productions to range from full-scale operas to concerts of selected highlights to tempt novice audiences. “We’ll never survive if we just do Puccini or Verdi so we’ve moved on to Andrea Bocelli and Il Divo who have made light classical music more popular,” says Cloete. “A purist will say that’s far from opera, but for me it’s more important that we present quality singing.”

People can also hire the singers for events like year-end functions, while Opera on the Go sees them perform in townships to reach new audiences.

Opera’s dwindling fan base is exacerbated by a lack of government funding for the arts and a cutback of arts coverage in newspapers that used to publicise performances. But shrinking support is a global problem. “Opera is struggling in other countries as much as we are. There’s the Metropolitan and La Scala, but hundreds of smaller houses are closing down. It’s an art form that the people who love it love very much, but that group is getting smaller,” Cloete says

Presenting an opera is also an expensive undertaking. “Opera doesn’t work like musicals where you can do 10,000 performances. It’s such a demanding art form that you can’t have a singer doing eight performances a week, it’s too strenuous on the voice,” he says. “Operas are also written for an orchestra of maybe 60 musicians, whereas a musical can get away with a band of five.”

Modiane (34) began by singing in church and school choirs and had never heard an opera until a teacher asked him to represent his school in a competition by singing an aria from Mozart.

Now he spends his time fund raising, performing, coaching the students and planning concerts for next year, in the hope that there will actually be a next year for them. His ambition is to join a European company, but he’s loath to leave Gauteng Opera when he’s one of the two main people keeping it afloat. “I want to be on stage in Europe but don’t want to leave the company in a bad state – I want to be able to say I’ve done a good job,” he says.

Gauteng Opera is blessed to have its own theatre so it doesn’t need to raise money to perform there. Having their own theatre also teaches the artists how to carry themselves on stage and interact with the audience. “When they’re performing I say ‘imagine you’re at La Scala or the Metropolitan – don’t think it’s Tin Town because then you won’t put your best foot forward.’ If you come to one of our shows you will be blown away,” he promises.