CJA staged as Opera

Email sent to
Ciaran Bagnall - lighting artist
Damian Cruden - staging director
AIne Sheil - opera theorist

Hi Ciaran,

Below are a couple of things to consider in your approach to the next CJA performance. I have included Damian and Aine in on this dialogue too; as you know Damian will be our eyes out front and use all his magic to bring this thing together, and Aine is an expert in Opera and staging at York University and is interested in this piece from the perspective of digital opera.

Firstly: I really like the way you have expanded on Damian's initial thoughts on the cinema-ness of the piece and introduced more than one gauze - the scope here is immense: an opportunity to use the whole stage as a 3D lighting box, and establish different strata. I imagine it will also give you the option to bleach the performers out and simply focus on colour or image, likewise to spot focus on Jon and I.

The piece is still in an experimental stage and I am keen to maintain this exploration for this performance. As such I want to encourage you to be experimental too. The Cape Jeremy Affair is not a piece of music about the report, nor is it with the report – as in a libretto – but something that is more inbetween. In this sense the music is created from within the report; that is to say, the imaginary dimension that the report generates when read, or was in the mind of the author when written.

What I want to suggest is that your light and visual show is not a direct reaction to the live music, but is something that evolves from the same place. By that I mean its creation is from within the sledge report (see abstract below) and that you create a 'light show' that is about this. Sometimes it will be in harmony with the music and sometimes it will be in dissonance. This is desirable! I believe that you will always make sense of it somehow; you will in your abstract/ literal responses to the evolving music get to grips with the situation ... and therefore the audience will too.

Damian has already had some profound response's to this piece and there will be moments where we will stage these (e.g. a moment when the musicians look at each other could be cue'd by the lighting state.) But also Damian has pointed out that the audience's relationship to the performers and to the music is always in flux - this relationship at times (perhaps at all times in a quantum sense) stretches across time and space: it is both now and then; the beginning and the middle and the end of the report; reflective and in the moment; here and there; intimate and human, vast and planetary. This multi-dimensionality of perception is embedded in the music and therefore any action to fix an interpretation using visual specificities could disrupt this delicate balance .... more reason to play with it too.

I do describe this piece as a play for musicians - although I am starting to understand it more as an opera. There are many clues in the word play for how you could approach this piece. Check out these http://www.thefreedictionary.com/play


I hope this is both food for thought and challenging and that we can have a playful time.

I look forward to that drink!

Cheers
Craig




Notes to the Light Artist (Taken from the original score)

Although this is a composition created for aural theatre the role of the lighting designer is still important to the wholeness of the audiences’ understanding of the theatre of sound and its sense of place.

Pre-performance design

Having read the abstract and having been present through some of the rehearsals the LD will design a lighting rig in response. The aim of the design is to help in the audiences transition from the visual to the auditory by illuminating the space in such a way that the colours and textures evoke a sense of place within the reality of the text. The role of the lights is not to light up the musicians, or audience, although they may be lit due to the pre-performance decisions.

Post-design performance

The LD will ‘mix’ the lights live during the performance, using either prepared states, or individual lanterns or a combination of both. It is not important to tell the ‘story’ of the evolving piece through light and colour, but to accompany it and provide a visual polyphony to the aural and the imagination. In this sense this improvised design is sensorial and not cognitive.





Abstract (verbatim):

“Tendebantque manus ripae ulterioris amore”

We proposed to do the journey with 20 days food taking the majority from Moraine Cove Depot (laid by “John Biscoe” in March 1968) and go via Terra Firma Islands, Mushroom Is, Puffball Is to K.G. Sound. We decided to keep clear of Terra Firma and Mushroom Islands due to pressure areas and low tabular bergs found there last year and also keep out from Bugge Islands for he same reason. The fact that we were carrying over 400 lbs of Geology/Geophysics equipment and clothing and other essential items for the Fossil Bluff “castaways” was a worry from the beginning but all items were considered vital even after severe pruning several times prior to our departure.

All went well to Terra Firma Is and from there on foul weather, bad surfaces and tide cracks plagued us until we got to Cape Jeremy. The dogs appeared to suffer from short rations. Once in the midst of the tide crack area it was hard to know what was happening around us and especially north. With such a short distance to go to where we thought KG Sound Barrier might be we were keen to push on hoping to get out of the cracks instead of returning over the route we had come south on.

By retreating after the first crack we had doubts whether we would in fact be able to make it back to Moraine Cove without support from Stonington; whereas the route south; where the work lay also; was still deemed possible. As always when sledging and working in the Antarctic the safety versus work angle was weighed time and time again.

During the time of the severe rationing our main concern was our paraffin supply for cooking and drying clothes. Each time we travelled, fed dogs, went outside the tent at all the accompanying high temperatures and drizzle soaked ones clothes. Also sleeping bags, gloves and footwear were also wet and the problems of a cold spell coming on with wet equipment was somewhat of a worry. Luckily in the first and second day of our return trip north the sun shone and the bad weather cleared so we were able to festoon our sledges with wet gear and dry everything out at last. The food shortage was not so much of a problem as long as we could shoot seal for men and dogs. We found that we were able to “stretch” the standard food box and although food was uppermost in our minds for much of the time; as mentioned above; fuel was the main concern.

We resigned ourselves to the sea ice conditions and possibilities of cracks opening up under the tents or between the sledges when travelling but there was little control we had over this factor. Strong winds from the south caused concern as to the possibility of the sea ice in Marguerite Bay going out but the majority of the wind was from the north with accompanying bad weather.

The return journey north was bliss compared with what we had experienced on the southern trip and was completed in 6 days compared with the 24 days outward journey over virtually the same route. The assistance of the relief party (Sledge “WHISKEY”) was sought firstly to lay a depot at Mushroom Island but they made good progress south on the improved surfaces and we finally met them at the Puffball Islands and all 6 sledges returned to Stonington together.