No such thing as bad publicity? Don't make me laugh.
Publication: Classical Music magazine
Publisher: Rhinegold
Frequency: Fortnightly
Format: My regular column under pen name Mad Margaret
Column Title: Opera on the Road: touring tales of a mobile mezzo
I used to be a publicity junkie. Any opportunity for a photo shoot or radio talk show, I'd be there, ready to shine, wit a-blazing. Problem was, word got out, and suddenly I became the person they called when “No-one Else Would Do It.”
One festival in central London latched onto this. When the performers in their latest extravaganza couldn't do the photo shoot hanging out of the sunroof of a Mini in the middle of Covent Garden piazza, guess who did. In a balldress. In the blazing sun. Wedged alongside a young tenor who'd been dragged from the chorus of a G&S operetta and hadn't a clue, let alone a costume. (I lent him a spare 17th century frockcoat I'd brought in my handbag just in case. You never know…)
An expectant crowd gathered in that “Er, Edna, something's happening over there” way that crowds do. The photographer was hanging off a restaurant balcony to shoot the Mini from above, and bellowed down the immortal words. “Just look as if you're singing a bit, can you?” So I mimed. Several old ladies in the audience turned up their hearing aids with a deafening whistle. “Nah, doesn't look right, can you really sing?” shouted the would-be David Bailey from above. So I sang a bit of Carmen. The crowd were under-whelmed. So I changed the words mid aria and explained about the photo shoot; “Here I am, stuck in a very very tiny car, Right in the dear old piazza.” That was more like it; the crowd even laughed at bit (except the ever-smiling Japanese tourists, who still hadn't worked out what was going on.)
Now the photographer was unimpressed; “Looks naff with just one of you with your mouth open, both of you sing!” I turned to the tenor. “What opera duets do you know?” and realised from his terrified expression he knew - nada. “What G&S are you in?” “Trial By Jury” he muttered. “OK, you sing the chorus, I'll sing the rest.” So we did. By the time Mr Flash Harry had lined up the shots, changed lenses and all but destroyed the restaurant's window boxes in his acrobatics, we'd sung “Trial” and were heading resolutely through the entire Savoy opera canon, with increasingly tetchy lyrics. By now the crowd was swelling fast, applauding each new song with vigour.
Finally, I was liberated from standing on the Mini's handbrake, much to the disappointment of the crowd, who disappeared faster than rabbits on roller skates when the publicity crew tried to move in with festival flyers. I awaited the results to appear in a national newspaper with eager anticipation. Was this to be the mezzo's great moment, even if I wasn't actually singing in the specially commissioned opera to be performed in said Mini? The great day finally dawned. I snatched the newspaper out of the paperboy's sweaty palm and tore it open. There it was; a picture of me singing - to a bemused pigeon and two passers by. The photographer had completely ignored the 200-strong audience I had royally entertained for thirty minutes and taken a shot of my backside, a bird and two blokes.
And I didn't even get paid.
© Copyright Kirsty Young. All rights reserved.
Published in Classical Music magazine 27 August 2005
return to Sample Articles page
Publisher: Rhinegold
Frequency: Fortnightly
Format: My regular column under pen name Mad Margaret
Column Title: Opera on the Road: touring tales of a mobile mezzo
I used to be a publicity junkie. Any opportunity for a photo shoot or radio talk show, I'd be there, ready to shine, wit a-blazing. Problem was, word got out, and suddenly I became the person they called when “No-one Else Would Do It.”
One festival in central London latched onto this. When the performers in their latest extravaganza couldn't do the photo shoot hanging out of the sunroof of a Mini in the middle of Covent Garden piazza, guess who did. In a balldress. In the blazing sun. Wedged alongside a young tenor who'd been dragged from the chorus of a G&S operetta and hadn't a clue, let alone a costume. (I lent him a spare 17th century frockcoat I'd brought in my handbag just in case. You never know…)
An expectant crowd gathered in that “Er, Edna, something's happening over there” way that crowds do. The photographer was hanging off a restaurant balcony to shoot the Mini from above, and bellowed down the immortal words. “Just look as if you're singing a bit, can you?” So I mimed. Several old ladies in the audience turned up their hearing aids with a deafening whistle. “Nah, doesn't look right, can you really sing?” shouted the would-be David Bailey from above. So I sang a bit of Carmen. The crowd were under-whelmed. So I changed the words mid aria and explained about the photo shoot; “Here I am, stuck in a very very tiny car, Right in the dear old piazza.” That was more like it; the crowd even laughed at bit (except the ever-smiling Japanese tourists, who still hadn't worked out what was going on.)
Now the photographer was unimpressed; “Looks naff with just one of you with your mouth open, both of you sing!” I turned to the tenor. “What opera duets do you know?” and realised from his terrified expression he knew - nada. “What G&S are you in?” “Trial By Jury” he muttered. “OK, you sing the chorus, I'll sing the rest.” So we did. By the time Mr Flash Harry had lined up the shots, changed lenses and all but destroyed the restaurant's window boxes in his acrobatics, we'd sung “Trial” and were heading resolutely through the entire Savoy opera canon, with increasingly tetchy lyrics. By now the crowd was swelling fast, applauding each new song with vigour.
Finally, I was liberated from standing on the Mini's handbrake, much to the disappointment of the crowd, who disappeared faster than rabbits on roller skates when the publicity crew tried to move in with festival flyers. I awaited the results to appear in a national newspaper with eager anticipation. Was this to be the mezzo's great moment, even if I wasn't actually singing in the specially commissioned opera to be performed in said Mini? The great day finally dawned. I snatched the newspaper out of the paperboy's sweaty palm and tore it open. There it was; a picture of me singing - to a bemused pigeon and two passers by. The photographer had completely ignored the 200-strong audience I had royally entertained for thirty minutes and taken a shot of my backside, a bird and two blokes.
And I didn't even get paid.
© Copyright Kirsty Young. All rights reserved.
Published in Classical Music magazine 27 August 2005
return to Sample Articles page
