The Lost Chord

Picture House at Belsay A Unique Evening With Opera North And Picture House At Belsay - Performances on June 2, July 7 and September 8 2007

Tickets are now on sale from English Heritage for one of the most atmospheric and unusual musical performances ever to be staged in the North East.

An audience of just 35 people will gather at Belsay Hall in Northumberland for an evening including a new, intimate choral and theatre piece inspired by Arthur Sullivan’s The Lost Chord, commissioned from Opera North.  The performances are on three nights only - June 2, July 7 and September 8.

These special evening shows are part of Picture House – a ground breaking exhibition of film, art and design at Belsay running until the autumn.  Each show will be complemented by dinner and a private tour of 13 other installations in the hall, castle and gardens by Picture House curator Judith King. All the artworks have been specially created for Belsay by leading film directors, actors, musicians, artists and fashion designers including Tilda Swinton, Mike Figgis and Viktor and Rolf.

Opera North’s interpretation is based on The Lost Chord, a Victorian ballad composed by Arthur Sullivan - one half of legendary operatic partnership Gilbert and Sullivan. At the time this was the best known and most frequently performed of all his works but its fame has faded through the generations.

Written around 1880, it was contemporary with the Middleton family’s residence at Belsay Hall. Sullivan wrote it to commemorate two aspects of his own life – the tragic death of his elder brother Frederick in 1877 and the happier circumstance of his lifelong passion for mistress Mrs Ronalds.

Tim Hopkins, commissioned by Opera North to make the show, said: “The piece is about a search for completeness, and how music can help us retrieve and rediscover the emotional echoes of lost human contact. It was an ideal starting point for a performance piece at Belsay because the hall is an abandoned home, rich with an atmosphere of loss and memory. As a building it has an architectural conflict between the grandeur of the design and its intended function as a family house, full of domestic human life. This conflict is reflected in the themes of the Lost Chord.”

Today, Belsay Hall’s deed of guardianship demands that it should never be refurnished. This condition has allowed English Heritage to host a series of contemporary arts exhibitions in its atmospheric empty rooms, of which Picture House is the fifth.

Tim said: “This is the first time I have worked in a building like Belsay. My background is in opera direction and usually that involves working in conventional theatre spaces. The Hall offers some exciting possibilities, creating a setting for a three-dimensional yet intimate singing-based entertainment with the audience as part of the performance.  Everyone who attends will have a different perspective, a different connection to the performers, freed in this instance from the traditional theatre context.

“The piece has two parts, one using the technology of Sullivan’s day, and the other using film, reflecting the range of approaches taken by artists elsewhere in the permanent exhibition, as they have made new works responding to the atmosphere and history of Belsay.”
The 45 minute performances will start at 7.00pm and be followed by dinner and a private tour of the Picture House exhibition.

Tickets £45 per person, with limited. To book, call 0870 333 1183.