Untold Stories
Karen Van Spall is in the business of telling hidden stories - women relegated to the footnotes of music history. Now, with the pandemic enveloping alI and closing down performance, the quiet “gives us a chance to tell our own stories”.
I am a singer, that I know for sure but I will add writer and producer to my credits, although tentatively, as this is a fairly new creative adventure for me.
Having spent most of my professional life embedded in the established operatic canon, I became increasingly frustrated with rehashing the same old stories over and over. I really started to wonder about character status and how it was that the opera world exhibited the same, well-worn tropes time and time again. Surely in the 21st century it was time to uncover the other stories hidden in the background? Gender and race are still being used as shorthand to create a story framework. Perhaps this sits so deeply in the mainstream that most creatives in the field can’t see beyond it? Well, that wasn’t for me. I decided to forge a different path, still within established repertoire, but pulling back and taking in the bigger picture. I’d always wondered about the women in the lives of famous men. How did Minna Wagner feel about Richard’s anti-Semitism? How did Clara Schumann cope with a career, family, and Robert? What about George Sand and Liszt and Chopin and all the others? Pauline Viardot, why don’t we hear more about her? In their day, these women were often more famous and successful than their male counterparts but somehow have been relegated to footnotes in music history.
My first opportunity to write a show came in 2017 when Melbourne was hosting a Ring Cycle. There was a fringe like festival around the main event and I thought there needed to be something in the mix that spoke to Wagner’s dark side. I wrote “Wagner in Paris” the story of his early days in France told from the point of view of Minna’s illegitimate daughter (known to the public as her younger sister). From there Liszt and Chopin followed and this has become our Paris Trilogy. Excavating the stories of the women in the background of these men has been deeply satisfying! Now I receive commissions. Last year Percy Grainger came under the microscope and Berlioz will follow in 2021. Beethoven was in process of being dissected for his 250th anniversary when the Covid-19 lockdown began.
Now that everything has gone quiet, I am searching for what it is I really want to do in the next phase of my life. It was the perfect time to ask some questions: first, what exactly makes me happy and how do I pursue it? The answer was pretty simple - my wonderful family and they are right here and actually, that’s enough, the rest is just a garnish. The next question on the list is harder. What diminishes me and how do I avoid it? I have discovered that the niggling, negative inner voice that criticised everything I tried to make and do was in fact a loud bellowing, outer voice and lockdown has shut it out. Who knew? The compromises we make to find cohesion in a stressful environment are eroding so I’m not making them anymore.
Performers are generally employed to tell other people’s stories and the quiet that has come over our industry gives us a chance to tell our own stories – in every form. A beautiful blog that connects us, the novel you’ve always wanted to write, letters, paintings, conversations and debates, all of these things that will make a difference to how we come out at the other end and I hope we come out changed!