Saturday 4 August 2012

Where The Wild Things Are/Higglety Pigglety Pop!

'Where The Wild Things Are/ Higglety Pigglety Pop!' premiered at Aldeburgh Music Festival on June 8th this year. They put me up in a charming and luxurious hotel called The Bell and arranged taxis to and from the show. The venue at Snape is breathtaking. This modern, stylish brick and dark wood building overlooks a wide stretch of marshes. Everyone in the bar was transfixed by the dark grey clouds, dazzling evening sun and a huge rainbow arching right across the sky. It was wonderful to see my work presented in such a beautiful and prestigious setting, which made all of the months of hard work worthwhile. Afterwards, the organisers threw an indulgent party for everyone involved and I stayed chatting to the opera singers and other artists until midnight. An adaptation of Higglety Pigglety Pop! is now moving to The Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood Music Centre in Boston. It will be performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra's Summer Academy for Advanced Musical Study. http://www.bso.org/micro-sites/tanglewood-music-center/about-us/the-festival-of-contemporary-music.aspx The academy have chosen not to perform the piece theatrically, so this month I animated Jennie the dog to fit in with the rest of the animations (in the production at Aldeburgh, Jennie was acted in costume by Lucy Schaufer). Netia and I were devastated at the news of Maurice Sendak's death, which came just as I was finishing the final animations for the show. The show had his personal approval and supervision form the beginning and he appeared to be very excited to see it. Netia considered the production not only an homage to his work, but a present to him.