Leo and Jo at Wimbledon Tennis Championships
This week our Artistic Director Joanna Turner & General Manager Leo Mercer headed to the Wimbledon Championships and Jo chatted to the Wimbledon Channel & everyone on Henman Hill about our exciting Die Fledermaus project supported by the Wimbledon Foundation’s Arts & Community Engagement Fund. Read more
We are looking for reliable, enthusiastic volunteers with an interest in theatre, music and community projects to help us create our Die Fledermaus re-imagined for high street locations across Merton & Wandsworth , South London between 1st – 14th August.
No experience necessary – all training will be provided! Volunteers will get a sneak peek into our rehearsals and travel expenses covered on performance days. We also provide tea & cake!
You only need to commit to a couple of hours per show – and of course you get to see the show too! Whether you can commit to one, two or all of the performances we’d love to hear from you!
To find out further details or if you have any questions please contact General Manager, Leo Mercer.
Need more info? check out our Die Fledermaus page.
We look forward to hearing from you!
| Date | Time | Location | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thu 1st Aug | 5pm | COLLIERS WOOD Starts at  Savacentre / The Qube, SW19 1DD |
FREE |
| Fri 2nd Aug | 11am | POLLARDS HILL Starts at New Horizon Centre cafe, CR4 1LT |
FREE |
| Sat 3rd Aug | 1pm | RAYNES PARK Starts at Waitrose, Raynes Park, SW20 0BS |
FREE |
| Sat 3rd Aug | 5pm | WIMBLEDON Starts at Elys, Wimbledon SW19 4DP |
FREE |
| Tue 6th Aug | 8pm | Arcola Theatre – Indoor Seated Version24 Ashwin St, Dalston, London E8 3DL |
Book at: Arcola Theatre |
| Wed 7th Aug | 8pm | Arcola Theatre – Indoor Seated Version24 Ashwin St, Dalston, London E8 3DL |
Book at: Arcola Theatre |
| Thu 8th Aug | 5pm | WANDSWORTH TOWN Starts at Southside Shopping Centre, SW18 4TQ |
FREE |
| Fri 9th Aug | 1pm | MITCHAM Starts at Morrisons, Mitcham, CR4 2JS |
FREE |
| Sat 10th Aug | 1pm | CLAPHAM JUNCTION Starts at ASDA, 204 Lavender HIll, Battersea, SW11 1JG |
FREE |
| Sat 10th Aug | 5pm | WIMBLEDON VILLAGE Starts at Bayley & Sage, 60 High Street, Wimbledon, SW19 5EE |
FREE |
| Tue 13th Aug | 1pm | MORDEN Starts at Oxfam, 31 London Road, Morden, SM4 5HT |
FREE |
| Tue 13th Aug | 5pm | TOOTING BROADWAY Starts at Tooting Market, Tooting High Street, SW17 0SN |
FREE |
| Wed 14th Aug | 1pm | ROEHAMPTON Starts at Roehampton Library, 2 Danebury, Ave, SW15 4HD |
FREE |
| Wed 14th Aug | 5pm | WIMBLEDON Starts at Elys, Wimbledon SW19 4DP |
FREE |
The Arcola (Dalston)
Grimeborn is the annual opera festival at one of London’s coolest theatres, The Arcola. Over the last ten years, the festival has become the home for adventurous takes on familiar classics, resurrections of forgotten gems, and premieres of brand new works. This year there are no less than 16 productions. There are £12 tickets available for each one. It’s cheap, it’s accessible – and it’s mindblowing when you realise how much there is to the opera world.
Don’t take our word for it. Here are some examples that we can’t wait for:
Bringing back unknown operas to life – like Scott Joplin’s TreemonishaSomehow Scott Joplin, the ‘King of Ragtime’, is only known for his famous piano tune The Entertainer. But then you hear about an American opera-musical like this, entirely ahead of its time, entirely relevant still – and with a title like Treemonisha… well, you just kinda have to go!
See also Aaron Copland’s Twelve Poems by Emily Dickinson.
Radical takes on opera classics – like Die FledermausOur very own artistic director Jo Turner and composer Leo Geyer return with a new take of Strauss’ classic. Working with designer Marina Hadjilouca and lighting designer Jack Weir, Baseless Fabric will bring our street opera indoors for two performances only, for an entirely new take on our style of relevant, irreverent opera re-imagining. Find out more here. Read more
Every two weeks, director Elen and musical director James lead a session in Cranmer Primary School. We chatted to Elen about what they’ve been working on.
Baseless Fabric Theatre workshop with primary school group – Wimbledon Foundation
Tell us a little bit about what you’ve been up to at Cranmer.
Since January, James (the musical director) and myself have been working with year 5 and 6 students from Cranmer Primary School. We’ve been devising scenes. We’ve written and composed music. We’ve used improvisation techniques to adapt the characters from Die Fledermaus.
It’s been a thoroughly enjoyable experience, not just because we’ve facilitated these young people in creating their own performance, but we’ve also witnessed their confidence grow and creative ideas flourish. Read more
Mitcham Library Beatboxing Workshop
Click the video above to play it!
Easter already feels like a long time ago but before eating too much chocolate we had a fab week with nearly 70 brilliant young people aged 12 – 16 and 5 different professional theatre practitioners creating great stuff in Mitcham Library’s Merton Arts Space!
Beatboxing, stage combat, puppetry, theatre design and of course drama! Each of the workshops was fully booked with a waiting list and from our post-workshop feedback forms sent to parents, 64% of respondents said their child had never taken part in arts activities before, and over 70% said their child gained new friends, new skills, more confidence and a desire to take part in more arts activities in the future. In fact, 100% said they would like to take part in the future so I think we can say the workshops were a resounding success! Read more
Beatboxing Workshop in Mitcham Library
Opera sounds beautiful, but then so does the sound of a roomful of young people buzzing as they take part in a theatre design workshop, or parents waxing lyrically about how grateful they are that we’ve been doing work in areas that might not normally offer arts activities like stage combat or puppetry. It’s been a pleasure to see how seriously Baseless Fabric takes its community engagement projects – from school groups visiting Wimbledon Tennis, workshops in Mitcham Library – and I’m excited to start playing a role in making these things happen.
Recently we took our Die Fledermaus adaptation into local community centres so that elderly lunch club groups can hear a professional opera singer and pianist perform live and chat to them about what it’s like to work as a professional musician.
We asked our session leaders to tell us what their favourite moment was: Read more
We’re thrilled to have these brilliantly talented professional practitioners sharing their skills with young people in Mitcham Library in our FREE Easter holidays. Check out their experience and don’t forget to sign up because spaces are limited!
So after the excitement of our young people’s workshops and our two school parallel productions for Die Fledermaus getting underway, we’re now pleased to tell you about our sessions for local elderly groups across Merton and Wandsworth!
Because our unique street opera concept means that audience members need to be able to stand for most of the performances and walk around to follow the story of our characters around the high street, it means it’s not suitable for those less physically able. So this means that we also go into local elderly organisations and run sessions for them so that they can also engage with our work.
We’re thrilled that shortly we’ll be running sessions at old friends including Merton & Morden Guild and Friends in St Helier, who we previously worked with for Drifting Dragons and A Secret Life as well as going to new organisations including the Alzheimer’s Society.
Our brilliant singers Claire Wild, Abigail Kelly and David Horton will sing a couple of arias for the groups accompanied on piano by Juliane Gallant and Giles Kennedy, talk to them about their work as professional opera singers and pianists while Astrid will talk about the company and show edited filming of the Die Fledermaus Research & Development and our previous Cosi Fan Tutte Street Opera.
We’ll be back in touch soon to let you know how the sessions go and our plans to run further sessions later on in the year! Read more
We are thrilled to be running some drama workshops at Mitcham Library, Merton Arts Space during the Easter holidays. We have some brilliant professional practitioners running these workshops, so if you are aged 12-16 sign up now!
CLICK to check out our brilliant workshop leaders!
