New Zealand Opera’s ‘The Turn of the Screw’ starts next week in Wellington, and there’s a special connection to it for new NZO Head of Music.
Lindy Tennent-Brown started in the role only a few months ago and ‘The Turn of the Screw’ is her first big production with the company. But it’s an opera that goes back to her student days.
Lindy Tennent-Brown Photo: Supplied
The well-known pianist, répétiteur, music director, and mentor of young artists was a student at Victoria University when her lecturer Dr Peter Walls suggested she be a répétiteur for the university’s staging of ‘The Magic Flute’.
But she didn’t really know what the répétiteur did at the time (“it’s a glamorous name for playing the same thing a lot of times!”), so she found a book in the library and tracked down some of the most well-known répétiteurs from around the world to ask them about their job.
She received a hand-written letter from pianist Martin Isepp who was the répétiteur for the original production of ‘The Turn of the Screw’ in Venice in 1954 and who worked closely with composer Benjamin Britten.
“That was the beginning of my interest in that work and it went on from there,” she says.
Lindy also worked at Aldeburgh where Britten set up his home.
New Zealand Opera’s season of ‘The Turn of the Screw’ starts on 3 October, and Lindy has been busy helping the singers get ready for their roles. She says the Head of Music position is complex, focusing on the singers’ preparation, upskilling the musicians and helping those in the back of the company.
“I help with languages and the shape of the vowels they make, right down to where they might breathe or how a breath might affect something,” she says. “My biggest kick is facilitating other people’s development… helping them do their job better.
“My biggest passion is to be a problem solver.”
And she’s thrilled to be working on a piece that is part of her history, and now her future. “It’s a story that’s inspired a lot of different creative minds,” she says. “At New Zealand Opera we’ve been talking about what is opera? We’ve come to this understanding that it’s telling stories through singing and this is a great example.”
The Turn of the Screw performances are in Wellington (3 and 5 October) and Auckland (18, 20 and 23 October).
