The Arsonists: A Tragi-Comic Opera about Love and Economics

This performance is presented as part of New Music North West 2017, a major festival showcasing new music in our region. Full details of the Festival can be found here: www.rncm.ac.uk/festivals/new-music-north-west.

World première performance.

Ian McMillan and Alan Edward Williams’ opera opens with a news report of a fire which has destroyed Megaboxx – the only large employer in the town. Police suspect arson, and one person is feared dead. We go back to reveal who has a reason to burn the place down, and who is dead – and why is Roy the boss coming back to Slackpit undercover? This is a ‘whydunnit’ as well as a ‘whodunnit’, and combines edgy contemporary textures with musical-theatre style ‘big tunes’. It’s also the first opera ever written to be sung entirely in a Northern English accent.

Matthew Kellett Frank
Richard Woodall Roy
Serenna Wagner Paulina
Nicholas Sales George
Sarah Helsby Hughes Gloria

Clark Rundell conductor

This performance will be semi-staged, with props and costumes.

Free admission, by ticket application only

Ticket applications will be open from 10am on Monday 30 October until 10pm on Sunday 5 November via the BBC Shows and Tours website bbc.co.uk/showsandtours/shows. Please note that audiences attending shows at all venues must bring photo ID.

Click here for directions to New Adelphi Theatre, University of Salford

This opera is a Heritage Opera/Savvy Productions co-production, in partnership with the BBC Philharmonic. The evening is part of the Red Brick Sessions - a series created by the BBC Philharmonic, in partnership with the University of Salford - bringing audience immersion and new technology to the forefront.