Humans in a Room
Philip Venables has been described as “one of the finest of the younger generation of composers working today” (The Guardian). We (Grand and Philip) found each other through 4.48 Psychosis or rather, he found me. After asking me “can you say this in a bedroom voice?” “You mean like 0898 Kitty?”, it was pretty much a done deal. Devilishly has pointed out that she has seen every English performance (including the NY premiere), and thus, is part of the 4.48 Psychosis family. An exclusive club…
I’m Philip, I’m a composer. I have no idea exactly why — it was just something that I always found stimulating. And I guess that’s even more true now that I’ve realised that music theatre is my favourite thing to make. My path to this was a bit zig-zaggy, first studying Natural Sciences, then switching to musical composition for postgrad studies at the Royal Academy of Music and the Guildhall, and I suppose the path to opera was mainly through a few workshops and such like, and then my first produced opera with the Royal Opera House via the Doctoral Composer in Residence scheme.
I was supposed to be taking a sabbatical in 19/20 season, to reflect, rest, and focus on ideas for future opera projects (I struggle to do this while writing music at the same time). But then I realised I couldn’t survive financially for the whole year without a commission, so I took on one project, which I was in the middle of writing when the Covid crisis hit. So in the end, I finished the piece for a cancelled performance, and luckily my contract was honoured, but it was a bit absurd to finish the piece knowing it wouldn’t have a premiere. But I’ve been quite lucky, compared to people who have lost all their work. I've only lost some, mainly guest teaching, so far. And in the end, perversely, I’ve had much more of the sabbatical than I thought I would.
Our London performances of Denis & Katya on 13+14 March were some of the last performances in London, and a weird atmosphere. The shows were sold out, but only half the audience showed up, and those that were there had a kind of solidarity at the cliff edge. It was a very supportive audience as a result! The day after, I got a last minute flight to Paris and stayed there with my boyfriend in the very strict French lockdown.
These two months were spent mainly baking and cooking, eating and drinking cocktails, reading, and doing as little work as possible, once I’d finished that piece for the cancelled show. I didn’t feel creative at all, and it still flummoxes me how people having been pushing to make work during this time. Even one or two zoom calls a day would seem stressful and exhausting to me. Each to their own. The hours and days passed very quickly, even though there was not much to do. I felt sad and angry about the UK Government handling of the situation, and lucky to be living in Germany. I was very happy to press pause on normal life, and happy to suspend contact with a lot of the outside world. The only main contact I had apart from some work calls was an almost daily 3pm Facetime with Ted Huffman.
Now I’m writing this two months later on the way back to Berlin on the train. I’ll be stuck at home in quarantine for 14 days when I arrive. And then I guess normal life will maybe resume — and I’m not sure how I feel about that yet. But I am beginning to miss friends and social contact, so I guess I’m looking forward to that. I’m not sure I’m looking forward to getting back to work in terms of deadlines and actual composing. For now I’m quite happy just reading, reflecting, thinking of things I would like to do in the future. That’s very valuable time, but I realise I’m very privileged to have it, compared to friends who’ve lost all their work, or other friends who are working in the NHS. I hope they can soon have some time off to reflect and recharge too.
I sympathise very much with performers, whose music-making and livelihood is much more sociable (and therefore precarious at the moment), than my solitary version of music-making. I have no idea what the future of live performance holds right now — only that I am quite sure that things are not going to go back to normal for a long time. Someone asked me recently if I wanted to make a virtual opera, but I’m not sure I’m ready to give up just yet on getting humans in a room for a collective live experience of music and theatre.
An enviable boot game.