Stanley Opera
excellence at a price everyone can afford

The cigarette girls of the factory. Scene from the opera Carmen Stanley Opera Concordia Theatre, Hinckley, Leicester, Leicestershire, Midlands in 2007The seduction of Don Jose (Nicky Bingham and Enzo Sozzo). Scene from the opera Carmen Stanley Opera Concordia Theatre, Hinckley, Leicester, Leicestershire, Midlands in 2007Michaela (Louise Clarke now Louise Duguid) is greeted by Morales (Jim Coley). Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007Don Jose (Enzo Sozzo) gives in to Carmen (Nicola Bingham). Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007

Carmen

As I see it...

If we are very lucky, most of us who appear on the Concordia Stage – whether in a musical, a play, an opera or a review – will experience one night when the production takes on a life and a momentum of its own that is more than just the sum of the cast’s individual contributions.

For the members of the cast, it generates a high that is to be treasured and filed away forever in the memory.  It is not an everyday experience – nor perhaps should it be.

Even more rare is the occasion when such a performance reaches right across the stage into the auditorium and sends the audience home from the Theatre on a similar high.

Such an event occurred on the last night of Carmen, when the audience was entranced by a mesmeric performance from the cast that went beyond excellence and made everyone present in the Theatre appreciate what a very special evening they had been part of.

As Max Boyce once memorably said about another event in another arena – “I was there…”

So thank you, Stanley Opera.

John Gibbon, May 2007 HCA Newsletter

The gypsies dance (Felicity Clarke, Hannah Bingham etc.). Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007The town children pretend to be soldiers (children from Dixie Grammar School). Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007The toreadors march. Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007The gypsies (Felicity Clarke, Debbie Coley, Colin Blackler, Nicola Bingham, Andrew Stuart) plan to smuggle the drugs. Scene from the opera Carmen performed at the Hinckley Concordia Theatre, Leicester, Leicestershire in 2007