Peace at last

UK TOUR | 22 OCT - 06 NOV 2023

OperaUpClose in partnership with Chickenshed Theatre and Southampton and Isle of Wight Music Hubs present Peace At Last, an opera for 3 – 5 year olds based on the picture book by Jill Murphy.

Mr Bear is desperately trying to get to sleep but is kept awake by the varying sounds of the night: Mrs Bear snoring, Baby Bear playing, a dripping tap, a clock ticking, an owl hooting…will he ever get any rest?!

Inspired by the enduringly popular book, Peace At Last is performed by three singers, harp and woodwind. For children aged 3-5, families and any adult with a sense of fun and wonder.

Based on the picture book by Jill Murphy
Music by Joanna Lee
Words by Robin Norton-Hale

Download Digital Programme

Running time: approximately 35 minutes

PEACE AT LAST text and illustrations © Jill Murphy, 1980

trailer

CAST

Baby Bear
Natasha is a British Indian soprano from Liverpool. She recently created the role of Jack in the critically acclaimed world premiere of Jonathan Dove’s Itch at Opera Holland Park and made a “stand out” role debut at WNO as Neera in Will Todd’s Migrations.
Other recent and upcoming roles include Frasquita/Carmen (OHP & Opera North), Cinderella/Mini Cinderella, cover Amore/Orfeo ed Euridice (Opera North), Baby Bear/Peace at Last (OperaUpClose), Zora/Svadba (Waterperry Opera Festival), Sukanya’s Friend/Sukanya (LPO), Carolina/Il Matrimonio Segreto, Nerina/La Fedeltà Premiata (Royal Opera House Mumbai), Susanna/Le nozze di Figaro, Adele/Die Fledermaus, Hanna/The Merry Widow (Opera Warwick). She is also a keen recitalist, most recently performing at The National Gallery and in DEBUT’s concert series at the Brunel Museum and Shoreditch Treehouse.
Awards include the Charles Wood International Song Prize and the OHP Award for Outstanding Emerging Talent. Natasha trained at the Royal Academy of Music, National Opera Studio and was a Serena Fenwick Young Artist with BYO. She is also a trained dancer and is now an ambassador for All England Dance, having previously been All England “Young Dancer of the Year”.

Mr Bear
Chuma Sijeqa is a South African baritone and completed a Master’s at Guildhall School of Music. He joined the Jette Parker Young Artist Programme’s 20th Anniversary Company where his roles included Angelotti in Tosca, Second Philistine in Samson et Dalila and Second Nazarine in Salome (ROH main stage). His roles have included Gasparo in Donizetti’s Rita and Schaunard in La bohème (Gauteng Opera); Don Bartolo in Le nozze di Figaro (New Generation Festival); The Father in Debussy’s The Prodigal Son and The Landlord in Hagemann’s Passion, Poison and Petrification (Pegasus Opera); Harašta in The Cunning Little Vixen (Opera Holland Park); Speaker in Die Zauberflöte (Welsh National Opera); and Woodcutter and Archivist in The Sapling (Linbury Theatre, ROH). Chuma’s upcoming projects are Franz in Marx in London (Scottish Opera) and Clistene in L’Olimpiade (Irish National Opera).

Mrs Bear
Gemma's operatic roles include Carmen (Opera South East), Grimgerde in Die Walküre (Grange Park Opera), Flora in La traviata (King’s Head), Maddalena in Rigoletto (France and UK tour), Marcellina in Le nozze di Figaro (Dartington International Festival), Dorabella in Così fan tutte (Opera Chez Cartier & Jacksons Lane Theatre) La Ciesca and Zita in Gianni Schicchi (Fulham Opera and Lunchbreak Opera respectively), Gertrude in Romeo et Juliette (Arcadian Opera), Flowermaiden in Parsifal (Elemental Opera), 2nd and 3rd Ladies in Die Zauberflöte (Zeist Opera Festival, Netherlands, St John’s Smith Square & Riverside Studios) and ensemble in six tours of John Ramster’s staged Messiah. Previous roles for OperaUpClose include Larina in Eugene Onegin and creating Mrs Bear in Peace at Last in 2019.
She has recorded and performed several operas in concert with Opera Rara including Semiramide, Il proscritto and La princesse de Trébizonde under the batons of Sir Mark Elder, Carlo Rizzi and Paul Daniel respectively.
Music theatre roles include Mrs Sowerberry & Mrs Bedwin in Oliver! and Fruma-Sarah in Fiddler on the Roof (Grange Park Opera and BBC Proms), the White Witch in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Creation Theatre, Oxford) and numerous performances from the G&S canon.

Harp
Nicolette is a highly sought-after harpist from Singapore. She has several international prizes to her name (twice runner-up of London’s Camac Harp Prize & third prize at the Szeged International Harp Competition) and now enjoys a varied freelance career in the UK. An avid chamber and orchestral performer, notable groups she has worked with recently include the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Ballet Sinfonia, Southbank Sinfonia, Waterperry Opera and Opera Upclose. Nicolette trained at the Royal Academy of Music, where she won all of its prizes for harp. Further orchestral training included the LPO's Foyle Future Firsts fellowship for its 2022-2023 season, and the Britten-Pears Young Artist Orchestra.

Clarinet / Musical Director
Originally from Shropshire, Greg studied at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and the Royal College of Music, where he graduated with Distinction.
He subsequently was a 2018 fellow of Southbank Sinfonia, an orchestra made up of graduates from around the world. Through this fellowship, he performed clarinets quintets by Mozart, Brahms and Finzi with the Allegri Quartet across Italy in the summer of 2021.
Now based in North London, Greg freelances throughout the UK with orchestras such the RPO, BBCSO, Britten Sinfonia, and Royal Northern Sinfonia. He also holds teaching posts at three leading West London schools. This year, Greg is touring with two OperaUpClose productions: The Flying Dutchman with Manchester Camerata and Peace At Last.
Outside of his musical endeavours, Greg is a keen runner, recently running marathons in Paris and Amsterdam, and has also recently completed a Software Engineering Bootcamp at Imperial College London.

CREATIVES

Set & Costume Design
Sophia Lovell Smith studied Theatre Arts at Bretton Hall. She is a designer for theatre, opera, dance and interactive performance for children. Sophia has just designed SALT (Lighthouse, Poole & Angel Exit), The Worst Princess (Full House Theatre) and Little Angel Theatre (The Bed). In 2022 Sophia created Chasing Dots (MishMash Prods & RNS, Sage/The Glasshouse, Gateshead), Catch A Sea Star (Seaglass Arts) Handa’s Surprise (Little Angel Theatre) and Jina and the STEM Sisters (HMDT) and London Rhymes, a band making music for toddlers.
Recent productions include 5 years with Spitalfields Music designing for the Musical Rumpus Programme, Maanika & the Wolf (Polka Theatre), The Bed for LAT (Offies 2020 finalist), My Mother Said I Never Should for Crucible, Sheffield Theatres & fingersmiths and Paper Aeroplane for Half Moon Theatre (Offies 2021 finalist).
Past work incl. Polka Theatre (Hatch, Operation Magic Carpet, Property of Polka), Southbank Centre (A Child's Guide To Brutalism), Barbican & ZArts (Sponge), Trestle Theatre (Rachel, Tonight we Fly), Royal & Derngate Theatres (Flathampton), Nottingham Playhouse (Wave), Theatre By The Lake (seasons inc. The Caretaker, Hello & Goodbye, Flame, The Bogus Woman), Unicorn (The Snow Queen), plus educational programmes for ROH, ETO and GLYPT. www.sophialovellsmith.co.uk

Lighting Design
Will is a professional Lighting Designer and has lit internationally and in London's West End. Will also works extensively as an educator, teaching Lighting Design at institutes such as Rose Bruford, Guildford School of Acting and University of Winchester. Recent lighting design credits include: ‘Beryl’ (Oldham Coliseum), ‘Romeo & Juliet’ (CBeebies Presents, BBC Television), 'Wave Me Goodbye' (Theatr Clwyd, Mold), 'Estron' (Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru), 'Gabriel' (UK Tour, Theatre6), 'Bear and Butterfly, 'Lullabub' and 'Luna' (Theatre Hullabaloo, Darlington) ‘Why The Whales Came’ (Watford Palace/Wizard Presents), ‘Two Gentlemen of Verona’, ‘As you Like It’, ‘Romeo and Juliet’, ‘Merry Wives of Windsor’ and ‘Comedy of Errors’ (Grosvenor Park Open Air Theatre, Chester), ‘I Believe in Unicorns’ (Wizard Presents, West End and Tour), ‘The Canterbury Tales’ (Guildford Shakespeare Company), ‘Moomin Summer Madness’ and ‘How to hide a Lion’ (Polka Theatre) ‘Hard Feelings’ (Finborough Theatre), ‘Mudlarks’ and ’66 Books’ (Bush Theatre, London), ‘Cinderella’, ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘Aladdin’ (Hertford Theatre), ‘Dream Space’ (Shakespeare’s Globe)
Will has lit many shows for younger audiences including 'Aliens Love Underpants', Monstersaurus', ‘Stuck’, ‘The Way Back Home’, ‘Don’t let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!’ and ‘The Legend of Perseus’ all for Big Wooden Horse. For Tall Stories he has lit ‘Snow Dragon’, ‘My Brother the Robot’, ‘Twinkle Twonkle’, ‘How the Giraffe got its Neck’, ‘Monster Hits’, and ‘Does A Monster Live Next Door?’.

Revival Director
Becca Marriott began her operatic career as a singer; performing numerous leading roles for OperaUpClose, The King's Head Theatre and Grange Park Opera (among others) to great critical acclaim.
Between 2016 and 2018 she crafted new dramaturgies and libretti for three award winning and award nominated opera adaptations for The King's Head Theatre - La bohéme (Olivier Award nominated) Tosca (Off West End Award winner), and La Traviata (Off West End Award nominated).
In 2019 she founded her own company - The Opera Makers, with a remit of supporting emerging artists while exploring radical opera adaptations with stunning production values on a fringe budget. In 2021 she adapted and wrote the libretto for the charity's first major production - Hopes & Fears - for the Grimeborn Opera Festival. In the past year she has directed a Punch & Judy puppet version of La Serva Padrona aimed at children aged 4-11 for The Opera Makers, as well as a bold reimagining of Puccini's Turandot; the first production of this piece outside of Asia to feature an entirely BESEA cast.
Becca is supported by Arts Council England's Developing Your Creative Practice.

WITH CHICKENSHED
Associate Director
Sarah currently works at Chickenshed theatre company, mainly within the theatre for children division. Creating new theatre and developmental activities for 0- 7 year olds, with a main focus on the song writing and music for the tales from the shed and planet play programs. She also supports BSL within the company for performances, teaching sessions, translating, as well as, outreach programs. She has been performing onstage from an early age, going on to get a degree in inclusive theatre practice.

PRODUCTION TEAM

Original production - Robin Norton-Hale

Musical Director - Greg Hearle

Rehearsal Pianist - Maria Struckova

Production Manager - Callum Finn

Company Stage Manager - Tracy Benner

Technical Stage Manager - Phoebe Butcher