 Good evening. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and good evening to our members and friends on Zoom. I'm delighted to, my name is Tony Burton, I'm the secretary of the society. And it's great pleasure tonight to introduce Alex Weedick, who is the general director of Scottish Opera. He became general director when he came to Scotland from New Zealand in 2006. Before that, he'd been executive director of New Zealand National Exhibition of Arts, an international exhibition, which he ran for a number of years. Tony became director of the new New Zealand Opera. His contribution to opera in Scotland has been remarkable. He has overseen productions that have traveled around the world of one awards. He has commissioned many new pieces of opera, shown for the first time. He encourages and oversees one of the finest education programs for children in opera, probably more advanced than anywhere else in Europe. He encourages and arranges for opera to be transmitted across Scotland to more than 50 locations, sometimes in villages way aware processing in winter. He is emerging artists. And not least, he's shown a dab hand at encouraging good new architecture. Look at the extension of the theatre royal that wonderful for you. I think Alex is a modest man. But I think I can generally say his contribution to opera in Scotland has been tremendous. Alex. Thank you for raising the bar. You know, good evening. Indeed, I am Alex Whedick and it's my great pleasure to be here speaking to you this evening. And indeed, Tony, it's 16 years and three days since I started at Scottish Opera. Don't quite know why but I remember the 6th of February for some reason. As Tony alluded, I've had a busy life both in the world of opera in New Zealand and indeed the world of opera here in Scotland and in Ireland and in lots of other places. A lot of it was freelance before I was finally lured into a more grown up role, if you like, with the New Zealand Festival before I then went to the then new New Zealand opera company. But I also just want to put out there that indeed I started life as a stagehand about 40 odd years ago with the New Zealand Opera Company and it was there that the kind of light as it were first went on. And I wouldn't want anyone to think of me as an encomer in inverted commas. I've been in and around and had the great pleasure of living and working in Scotland. And I started with the encomers from 1988 to be precise. That included being part of the Edinburgh Fringe Mayfest here in Glasgow, Scottish Opera in another role and of course the Scottish Chamber Orchestra so I think myself and the family have landed here with a reasonable degree of legitimacy over the last 16 years. I thought I might pose three questions to myself this evening if you like and feel for you to consider, and there's sort of an attempt to answer them myself in the finest traditions. So the first question is, what is opera. Secondly, who is Scottish opera. And thirdly, who are we as an opera company in the 21st century. Firstly, what is opera. And, you know, I'm conscious that many people both are on screen tonight and indeed in the room here will have already a long, well established history with not only Scottish opera but with the art form so I'm going to just take you through a brief potted history. A bit like this. So opera is an art form that can can be seen to have been developed from several strands of music making prevalent at the end of the 16th century. One was the development of the Madrigal from a setting of short poem for several voices to a more obviously dramatic scene in several sections, telling some sort of story or depicting some sort of extended emotional sequence. There are wonderful examples of these in the six books of Madrigals published by Monteverdi in the early 1600s, but earlier composers also laid the groundwork for this type of composition. The drawback of these in terms of pure storytelling was that the text was frequently obscured by imitative counterpoint between the voices. This parallels the similar objections that many have in church music of the time, in other words that the musical treatment of the text was so elaborate, the words could not be understood. So the other strand was a desire led by members of a group calling themselves the Florentine camarata, obviously cultured business and noble men from Florence, who wanted to use the model. They wanted to use the model of the plays of the ancient Greek stage to revive the art of storytelling through music. The text would simply be sung to musical pitches in a style we would probably recognize nowadays as recitative, which would be accompanied by simple chords from a keyboard instrument. It's also why the Greek myths provided the plots for many of these early operas, the first of which is generally held to be Daphne written in 1597 by Giacomo Perry. It also contained simple choruses, which were sung in block chords, again so the text was made clear, and small orchestral interludes, which may have been danced to. The operas of Monteverdi, which are among the earliest still surviving follow this general pattern. Meanwhile, interestingly in France, the development of a more hybrid form, the opera ballet in which the dance element was as important as the singing, and in which the role of the orchestra was expanded to help to help forward the drama was one of the important legacies of the court of the Sun King, Louis XIV. The development of ballet would remain a feature of French opera, right through its history until the beginning of the 20th century. And for those of you that are observers of opera companies in France you will note that many of them have a ballet company attached and described as the opera ballet of Leon, for example. As the singers involved in these early attempts at musical storytelling became more skilled, skilled, they in turn demanded more opportunity to show off their voices while telling the stories, and the solo aria came into being. By the time Handel was writing his operas in the first 25 years of the 1700s, the aria was the main form of vocal expression, the singers were calling the shots, and opera had become a vehicle for vocal display first and foremost with the plot and their intention to hang the music on. This lead look in his setting of Orpheus, of Orpheus' legend Orphe and Muradicce, and his other operas written in the 1760s and 1770s, to try to reform the art by getting back to using the music, both vocal and orchestral, simply to tell the story and to minimize or even eradicate vocal display for its own sake. I have a couple of images here to share with you of our own Orpheus and Muradicce directed by Ashley Page, known to some of us as the former boss of Scottish Ballet. And he created an amazing production for us with designer Johann Engels that really brought in a very visual, extraordinarily visual way the opera to life for us. I'll leave this image hanging for a moment or two for you. Since then, the whole history of opera can be viewed as a centuries old battle to keep these various strands within bounds. In the early 19th century, with Italian composers like Bellini, Donizetti, and Rossini, vocal display became a paramount and sometimes as disparaging you referred to as canary singing. And while north of the Alps, after Gluck, composers like Mozart, Beethoven, even though he only wrote one opera, Weber and then Wagner gradually expanded the orchestral contribution from a mere accompaniment to a more dominant role, and the creation of a complete work of art or Wagner's Ghazam Kunstwerk, which would use all of the available elements to tell the story. I would like to share with you a couple of images from Scottish Opera's Ring Cycle, maybe known to some of you that we presented in the early part of this century. There's something about these rhyme maidens that I always find particularly captivating, maybe it's the energy and the fact that they're firmly landed in the middle of the 21st century that somehow echoes with me. The 19th century composers of other nationalities, even Bizet and Puccini, adopted these techniques, they were often severely castigated and labeled Wagnerian. It's also important, more so now post COVID to remember that the idea of a hushed audience sitting in a darkened auditorium and following a drama told in music all the way to its conclusion is a comparatively recent idea in the grand scheme of things, and only from the mid 19th century Wagner again is the reason we have to thank for that. Up until then, a box at the opera with convenient curtains was used for entertainment of various kinds, allegedly, of which actually listening to and watching what was being presented on stage was allegedly only one element. The 19th century French operas frequently introduced their ballets towards the end of the performance, simply because many of the mainly male patrons would still be at dinner when the earlier acts were being performed. And oddly, similarly today, favorite singers would have their followers and fans who would pay attention when those singers appeared on stage, but would be less interested in other parts of the opera. The vogue spread to other countries, particularly those in Eastern Europe, opera also became a vehicle for retelling of their own history and legends. Many 19th century check and Russian operas exemplify this trend. There was an argument that the heyday of opera may have been the end of the 19th and beginning of 20th centuries, when the grandness of the art form reached a peak. In the 19th century, many operas were still being written, of course, but often on a smaller scale, financial considerations playing a significant part in this development, though the attractions of the art form proved still as appealing as ever for composers. Many singers, meanwhile, seem to prefer the well trodden paths of earlier composers, frequently taking refuge in discovering more of the operas in the past than introducing new ideas. And on their voices by the musical language of many contemporary composers, undoubtedly played a part in this. The most successful 20th and 21st century operas are often those in which the musical language, while not in any way imitating that of older composers, builds and further develops the traditions they established. I dare to say the age of the prima donna is not yet passed. There have always been and continue to be singers who've caught the public imagination in the very positive sense of the word artists like Dame Janet Baker and Sir Thomas Allen are well Kent voices and faces with us at Scottish Opera. I would argue also that in the past half century or so it is now the producer or director who was called the shots, not the conductor. Though more recently it seems that more radical directorial ideas get get abandoned as a simple desire to tell stories in an operatic form becomes more prevalent again, thankfully. For example, I'm really pleased to know that we have Glasgow born director Sir David McVicar very closely associated with Scottish Opera and his rich productions have graced the world stages, largely because he is an incredible artist and an incredible musician and an incredible director. And it's the it's the sum of those parts that enables absolutely amazing performances to be staged by him. It's also interesting of course that he. There are some, if not many who give him credit in particular for reviving the fortunes of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, because of the quality and theatricality of the productions that he's brought over the over the last decade or so. What is simply marvelous and in my view unable to be achieved in any other performance art form in any way is that when all the elements involved come together, the results make what Dr Johnson referred to as exotic and irrational entertainment, one of the most satisfying performance art forms we have. And as I gaze around the opera scene over the last decade, I would suggest that there's been an absolute explosion of both opera form and opera function. Compared with 15 years ago, alongside an array of amazing productions on stage. We now have so many smaller opera companies rightfully claiming their space, a plethora of summer opera festivals across the UK presenting interesting and exciting new productions. An abundance of new writing, the full embrace of the digital era both technically and for and for audiences and indeed this evening as an example of that, and the happy divergence into the likes of the world of silent opera, and an incredible pottery of emerging artists programs for post and postgraduate artists and singers. So in my view, I don't know, but I think the opera space is pretty pretty positive out there at the moment. Who is Scottish opera and sub question what sets us apart. So, many of you will know this but for those that don't, I would just remind you that Scottish opera was founded in 1962, during the fifth 1962, when a young Scots conductor Alexander Gibson returned to Scotland to work with the RSNO. And he then determined to also create an opera company to, in his words, lay the treasures of this art form at the feet of the Scottish people. Supported by his fellow founders, Ainsley Miller, Ian Roger, and Richard Telfer, a gang of four, as they became known. Scottish opera opened on the fifth of June 1962 in the Kings Theatre here in Glasgow, with an inaugural season of two quite contrasting operas, Buccini's Madame Butterfly and Debussy's Palaeus and Melissonde. So we moved to an image from our recently recent production directed by Sir David Mavica of Palaeus and Melissonde. I think the point that's really interesting about this double bill 60 years ago is the is the tone, the artistic vision, it's set of quite contrasting repertoire for Scottish opera at a time, particularly when whilst Virginia and Verdi were reasonably composed to work with, there was very little French repertoire being presented in the UK. And so, Alex Gibson from the get go set out a vision that was about well known and less known works in that inaugural season. And that to a large extent is what we hold on to, to the present day. Indeed we as a company are quietly getting ourselves ready as we come out of covered for our 60th anniversary in about four months time. And so, with apologies to the geneticists who are here this evening. I often describe Scottish opera as having four strands to its DNA. And I say this because, whilst we are so much more than the operas we present on the large stage. Nevertheless, we are nothing without the operas we present on the large stage. And the first of the four strands of DNA. The first strand really is our main stage repertoire and the touring of that, particularly from Glasgow to Edinburgh, Aberdeen and in Venice. And by main stage, we mean presented on the large stages that opera presented as the composer intended it to be presented. And with chorus with orchestra obviously the scenery with costume sets the whole nervous works coming together with an amazing collection of singers, really clever director a marvelous conductor to present work at a scale as we all know it and as it is intent was is was intended for the large theaters. But in putting a sort of balance basket together of repertoire every season. There are many many factors that Stuart Stratford who's our music director and myself and the team have to hold in tension. There are, of course, the composers on which composers would we like to present the season or his work would we like to present the season. What language, perhaps we might not present it and present it in the language it was written but we might defer to English. But we also have to consider and weigh out whether we can afford to do all our operas with a chorus or whether we have to find some non chorus repertoire, whether we weigh out whether we revive an existing production or whether we create a new production. Money of course, as ever plays a huge role in this, but also most importantly, actually our job is to create a balanced basket of repertoire of work that you guys, our audience want to come and see. We also have to balance the frequency of performance against audience demand. So in other words, something like a NABOM or a man and butterfly. We typically return to about every six or seven years, because that statistically shows us it's about the right rate of return in terms of repeating. We weigh out with our productions. Do we create a new production of a favorite title or do we revive an older existing production. Those of you that have attended our performances will undoubtedly have seen Tosca, the fantastic Anthony Bash production designed by Peter Rice that is just over 41 years old. We've had nine appearances with Scottish Opera and numerous appearances both in Europe, North America, even as far south of New Zealand. And it's a really strong stylish production, distinctive. And honestly, I don't see any reason why we would contemplate a change. However, other new productions do need, or other, we'd sorry, we do need to create productions of other popular titles. And over the years that I've been here we've tried to ensure we've got a really good muster of really good quality productions of the more popular titles, as indeed I believe any self respecting national opera company must have. We have to have an artistic view on these titles, particularly the most frequently performed operas from around the world. And this, this particular statistic is, is an accumulation of titles presented by companies, not numbers of performances, but inevitably the top three in no particular order but inevitably the Chinese love I am bees as common and various other, but also normally clustered within the top 10 you've got because he Barbara Seville Don Giovanni marriage a figure and Regaletto. I've got a couple of photos here of our fabulous production of the Barbara Seville directed by Sir Thomas Allen, which was, we, we still shop had not done this for a very long time, brought it into rep we've done it twice. And it continues to be a really fabulous audience favorite. And then Sir Thomas Allen, as part of a body of work he's created for the company. He also created terrific production of Don Giovanni of Mozart's Don Giovanni, which it'll be rude of me not to say to you that we're intending to stage it a little later this year. And so, all customers suitably welcome. And also, I'll just go back to the, sorry, to stay there for a moment, sorry. We also, I believe we have a duty of care to our audiences to make to make sure that when we can we present a broad range of other of operas. So one seasoned student I will try to put together two popular well known titles, mixed alongside lesser known works from either better known composers or operas that may have not been done very often. And when we're exploring the idea of works that have not been done very often. It's quite common to bump into the sort of accidental rule of thumb that goes, gosh, when did Scottish opera last do this title, and the answer is inevitably about 25 years ago. It's also fair to say that, you know, inevitably, some people would argue that opera is not just for them. Fair enough, but I think we have three tools, three key tools that we deploy to help us as much as possible. The first tool is a bit invisible but it is actually that our average net ticket price is typically just below 30 pounds, because we're very keen that the doesn't feature as something that would attract the attention of the red dots. We're also conscious that people have choices to make about how they spend their money. And we work very hard to keep our ticket pricing at a point where most of us, most of you can afford to go for a reasonable ticket price. You do also have to remember that actually on a good night is at least 140 people involved in telling that story so we can't give it away. The 30 odd quid is considerably less than what many people are happy to pay for a significant sporting event or other evening in a theater or a hall somewhere. The other secret, but very good tool has been our under 2610 pound ticket which we launched about 15 odd years ago. It, it's initially was designed to encourage people like us to bring our children or our grandchildren or nieces etc to the opera, we would pay the normal price. And those young people would be sitting next to us for 10 pounds. So it became a way of opening the art form easily for both financial and sort of access reasons. It then was very happily widely adopted by many people, particularly in the universities. And these days, approximately 10% of our audience is in fact coming on the under 2610 pound ticket, which is brilliant. All sorts of lovely anecdotal outcomes, one of which is that, say, other than the opening night of the season, typically our average audience demographic has come down somewhat. There's a lot of younger faces in the auditorium. And indeed in the foyer is secondly, interestingly, many of the folk using those tickets are very happy to be the best stress people in the four years and I think that's a really interesting one spin of the cliche of going to the art form coming to opera. And thirdly, there is a certain gentleman who will remain nameless who took exceptional advantage of our ticket as a dating model, and would appear frequently at performances with a different young woman into I congratulate him on his endeavors. I suppose the thing that we actually do seriously, really well as I think we work incredibly hard on our musical and theatrical standards to ensure that you our audience have as good and emotionally satisfying experience as possible. The second strand of our DNA is smaller scale touring. And we, Scottish opera have been touring at all sorts of levels scales around Scotland for well over 30 years. It's not always obvious but in fact we have a gene pool of over 110 smaller communities around Scotland, from which we seek to perform roughly once every, roughly once every three years so we try to get our sort of internal KPI as it were as we tried to get to about 35 communities every year with our smaller scale touring. The question I'm often asked is why are we so committed to Scott touring in Scotland, and fundamentally for myself and Russ at Scottish Opera, I think national reach. It's a sort of powerful articulation of our commitment, and indeed what I believe to be our duty to the Scottish audiences but also duty to the Scottish taxpayers, you know to genuinely reach as much of Scotland as we can. And I think that as an aside that for many years and in many communities, we have often been the only professional performance that reaches that community in any given year. It's also true. And indeed we were in Webster's last night with the launch of our spring tour opera highlights tour. It's also true that many of the venues we go to might only hold 100 or 120 or 150 people. It's also true that those venues are exactly the right size for the communities in which they're landed. And we often have incredibly full houses. And I've got a lovely memory of being many years ago in Balahoolish when we were touring there with a small production, absolutely pouring down, you know, classic Scottish winter weather pouring down. We were wearing a very long drizzly bone that went sort of down to her boots and a drizzly bone hat. As you came into the foyer, took off a drizzly bone hat to reveal beautifully prepared here, took off the long coat to reveal this gorgeous dress, pulled a pair of high heels out of her poachers and within sort of 30 seconds have been transformed into someone who was definitely dressed for a good night at the opera. And I asked her how long it had taken to come to the Balahoolish Hall and she said well it's taken me about 20 minutes to stomp across the fields from the farm. And, you know, I think that's a for me it was a really interesting introduction to the commitment our audiences show. In our 50th anniversary, 10 years ago, we set about delivering what we called 5050, which is we managed to visit across all of our work, 50 communities in our 50th anniversary with a sub statistic that 90% of the population of Scotland was within 30 minutes drive of one of our performances across that year. So we consider that Scotland in its totality is approximately 40% of the land mass of the UK. I don't think that was too bad an achievement. However, the bars now moved in our 60th anniversary to trying to 60 performances in our 60th. The third strand of our DNA is all the work that we do in education and outreach. And much of this is less visible. And as Tony very kindly said we are the first, you know, we are the, you know, we were the first of our kind and we're still the oldest outreach and education team, many opera company in Europe, established over 50 years ago in the early days of both Alexander Gibson and and the ethos of the team really is to break down barriers to the art form connect communities, inspire people from all backgrounds and inspire people from all backgrounds through opera. We've been a trailblazer in our community arts engagement across Scotland and internationally, and we've played a seminal role in educational experiences for generations of Scottish people. And we've developed a year round program of youth and community work. And again, in our travels we are frequently bump into people who say, I can remember going to see you in a promise the work of the company in a primary school. And then my kids went, and then my grandkids are going. So I think that's something really powerful about the roots the way continue to land in the communities. And our primary schools tour, which has now engaged over half a million children in the arts across all of the 32 local authorities, and we've worked with over 9,000 pupils from over 130 schools every year. You know, so innovate we also do innovative work for infants and groundbreaking work for people with dementia. So the package of it all we create meaningful and transformative experiences for people of all ages. And secondly, one of the productions we created was Bambino, which, sorry, big button baby, oh, Bambino even we did both of them but the one I'm trying to remember is baby, which was for sort of six to 18 month old babies as part of introducing very young people, very, very young children to sound and singing. We got quite a lot of international attention with that and including an opportunity to present it in Paris through the British Council but also a metropolitan opera, quite engaged with the idea. One of my jobs on a visit to New York was to go to the Met with Peter Galb, who is the intendant there and wander around the buildings trying to find which space we could use to present the performance and it happened to be a lecture theater similar to this, but also to find a supplementary space that could be a pram garage, or all of the mums bringing their kids along, who'd have thought that would be a useful use of a morning in New York. So, I should say during the pandemic, the team have to, you know, have team the team of devised a program of new ways of delivering opera outdoors, which was crucial to support our audiences, returning to live performance, not only for entertainment but also for the associated health and well being benefits. We have to reach out to all sections of the community that we serve and to be at the forefront of the Scottish cultural sectors capacity to affect change for good in the lives of all of our citizens, including older adults, specifically those living with dementia, children and young people facing educational challenge challenges that also impact detrimentally on their social and economic development. The key aim is to sharpen the focus on our program with the intersection, intersectionality of the wider health and education agendas and manifesto pledges, such as the development of social prescribing network and health and well being Scotland network. This work is already well established through programs such as our memory spinners and dementia friendly performances for those living with various forms of dementia. And our being extended to welcome patrons with neurological illnesses, mobility issues, neurodiverse conditions and other life challenges that make attending a full length performance difficult. In 2013, we developed a body of work with breath cycle, which was a project for people with cystic fibrosis which was done in partnership with the gut naval. We have now taken that piece of work and called breath cycle to to engage long COVID patients in a series of online sessions covering vocal exercises and techniques that aim to enhance lung capacity and promote core physical strength. And interestingly participants can also take part in workshops where under the mentorship of a composer and the brightest, they can build emotional resilience and mental well being through the creation of songs illustrating their personal experiences of the world. We've also got a little project underway called sweet sounds and wild places, which is a creative exploration through music plot line and central character of the at the heart of Walter Scott's novel and Donald's at his opera, the chair to learn more for women and those identifying as female who face challenges in their mental and physical health and spiritual well being over the past two years as a result of the COVID panic, COVID-19 panic. And we're also will be having exhibition featuring their visual song visual art songs and creative writing, which will turn to communities later in 22. I touched earlier an additional impact of the company's third strand of educational outreach identity is the international work, which offers both revenue enhancing possibilities and considerable prestige for both the company and its key stakeholder the Scottish government, which is associated obviously with all the international recognition of our work skills and experience. It ranges from partnerships and cooperations with education and cultural institutions in countries, including in particular China and a man to the international touring potential production such as baby and Bambino, which, as I said, have visited Paris and the and interestingly in a further endorsement of these cross cultural partnerships. The award in 2017 of the Confucius classroom status by Chinese handband council and the partnership with prestigious bank OD international school in Beijing which we've sustained now for five years. And I guess, as Tony alluded to in his introduction the fourth strand of our DNA and one that sits very close to my heart has been over the past 16 years we've been very active in the area of new commissions. As you may recall, our inaugural sort of 515 operas made in Scotland where we, which we premiered in 2008, and over the three years we presented, or we commissioned 15 new 15 minute operas that managed to sell out 26 performances across Scotland to great. We're going to divert here briefly and say what was interesting about the three years, each of which had five operas was that I did a little bit of maths which said if there are five composers and five librettists and five sort of subject matters. So broadly, five times five times five is 125. That gives you a sense of the range of opinions you could encounter any one of the evenings of these five 15s, but it was fascinating because we had a whole array of creative collaborators. Some of them would never work together some had never worked in our art form, but also it was a response to the challenge of how could we Scottish opera take our rightful place with regard to new work in the 21st century. Because without it will never renew our art form, and given that opera, as many of you will knows an incredibly complicated art form to get right, you know, get the words right to get the music right and then to get it on stage seemed to me that the 15 minute model was a fabulous way of, you know embracing so many people who suggested to us they would like to get closer to making new work. That led over the years to an array of longer new commissions which kind of culminated on stage in in a new commission called Anthropocene, and I think I have a slide here. Anthropocene by Stuart McCrae and author, librettist Louise Walsh, who in fact is on the team here at Glasgow University, very much a focus on the climate emergency and its impact. And are following on from that we also commissioned new film called the narcissistic fish, which was a leap frog over the filming of performances to the creation of an opera film set in an Edinburgh kitchen, three characters domestic drama, filmed by us, in fact well in advance of covert, but by the time it had been edited and was prepared, we were able to launch it in the early stages of covert as part of our digital response to how we could cope with the covert challenges. Why, why is, why are new commissions so important. Well in my view. I think it's our role as the largest opera maker in Scotland's music and opera ecology to provide a platform for the next generation of opera makers composers and librettists. It's kind of it's sort of what I believe our duty is a national performing company to be. So, the sum of all of these parts main stage touring education and outreach and new commissions makes us and this is where I must apologize for my grandma, but it makes us in my view, the most unique opera company in the UK, if not considerably further a field. So some of all of those parts and our sustained commitment to all of that, that makes us who I believe we are. That's the third subject for my talk this evening is. So, where are we now here, where are we now here in the 21st century. So, I think the first thing I want to say is that opera is actually an incredibly resilient art form. Indeed, it's been much more resilient and much less grand than many would give it credit for. I mean if you do buy into the cinematic cliche, or even images from some of the grand opera houses around the world. And you could be forgiven for assuming that dress codes and behaviors are certain dress codes and certain behaviors are required, and that certain diva behaviors prevail in my opera travels around the world, I would say that by and I that's simply not true. I mean I've seen in my travels that it's possible to write amazing new work to stage incredible productions that captivate audiences without the traditional frame of a preceding march or an orchestra pit. I mean, not the one knowingly step away from them. But if you do, it doesn't in any way, in the right context, devalue or diminish the art form. I mean, obviously the conditions have to be the best possible for the music and singing to serve the drama, as well as possible. But, you know, can our art form work as well in a tent in paisley or opera Holland Park in London, or in a warehouse in Birmingham, or in a quarry in Finland, or even in the back of a one of our lorries in the Western Isles on the rainy day, of course it can. And in the past two years, certainly worth saying that opera's resilience has been sorely tested and singularly re examined. It has certainly been the great disruptor for the performing arts here in Scotland. And as many of you obviously know it's sadly infected and affected many of our friends and colleagues. It's closed our theaters prevented many people from working and disconnected many of our audiences from live performances, but equally covert therefore has challenged us to, and indeed required us to change organizationally. And interestingly that it is interesting that the power balance has shifted. We've always relied heavily on our freelance artists and making teams, and all the crew, who are freelancers who have enjoyed many repeat contracts with us and have toured with us and they're almost effectively members of our family. Many of now left the sector due to covert and or have been seduced by the vibrant film and TV sector, which offers both considerably higher wages, double in many cases, and usually better work life balance. And of course, the other word that we're going to use here is not only covert but the dreaded be word Brexit, which has also led to a significant diminution of labor of skills, and also materials and in terms of lead to upwelling of price. Interestingly of course coming out of covert like many organizations not particular to Scottish opera work life balance has become a predominant consideration. Not only for people who are with us but also for us as we face the great resignation that's been labeled with many retirements from the orchestra and within the organization people going do you know what covert has shown me I could live my life slightly differently. And also it's sort of added a bit of jet fuel to people's perhaps slightly more lingering thoughts about whether or not to change the way they live. As we are tonight we've had to adopt and adapt to many new ways of working, including mask wearing sanitizing social distancing and many other mitigations. Only one of my roles pre covert was to prowl the orchestra pets of the theaters we perform and do my best to identify drafts and get rid of them because obviously cold air effects both player health and their hands and also can affect instruments. Working very closely with resident mechanical electrical engineers Mabbots just down the road putting a plug in for them. We've been able to do a lot of work on improving and supplementing the airflow, not only in our rehearsal rooms, but also in the theaters to keep our orchestra pets safe. It's included a lot of work on the building management systems, lots of supplementary fans co to monitoring me wandering around, seeing that there are sufficient drafts as opposed to no drafts. But happily that and so many other mitigations have ensured that we as a performing company have been able to make our work happen, but also do our best to keep covert at bay. And also a supplementary benefit has been that actually on the whole we've greatly improved audience comfort in our auditorium. Also, this time has been an amazing accelerator of change, some of which we we had in the past been slow to adopt, or indeed to be honest we've been quite nervous of pre covert our digital outcomes have been our digital journey in fact had been lagging the digital outcomes other than some podcasts, but now over covert they've really developed. We put together a six or seven filmed concerts or operas, where the orchestra on the stage of the theater royal and the cast were on the fourth stage. A little bit semi stage but enable us to reach out to and maintain contact with our audiences. We've also recently filmed our return to life performance with the production of the gondoliers that film is now has been edited and we're now just in negotiations with various platforms to see where we could host it. Good springs me to the visual relief for you. This is gondoliers on stage at the theater royal. Interestingly, this production has scale of this production has been enabled because of our partnership with both the doily cart opera company and the state opera of South Australia, who will be presenting it in due course. Thank you, who are part of this journey this evening, have time in hand where we performing at the Hackney empire in London for in the last week of March, just saying good luck to attend. It's interesting this production was absolutely a salient tree reminder of the perils of both covert and Brexit. All the costume materials were very expensive to acquire because supply shortages, and also many of our making teams had either gone off to the film land or we're finding it difficult to return to work. So this should have been a relatively straightforward production for us to put together three or four years ago became much more of a protracted journey. But if we get this right, it'll be on Sky Arts, it's sometime in the very near future. I also just earlier had mentioned that we released the narcissistic fish, which have been created before lockdown, but we were timid and it's released alongside the telephone which monotonous the telephone which we've made for the International Festival 2020. We also learned to work an awful lot better outdoors. I mean we had our roots in the Paisley Opera House with our production of Pagliacci in 2018. But over as 2020 marched on. And as we were coming to terms with what was initially, you know, imagined as relatively short term. The intention of return to work became clear that this was going to become prolongated. And so we try to imagine a response to this by thinking, we've got an orchestra that need to work. A lot of artists around us who have been wrapped up in the furlough scheme, who also want to work. You guys are audience desperate for some live performance. With a bit of deft footwork, we were able to turn our South Carpac at our production studios in Eddington Street, just the other side of the M8 into an opera house, as it were for about 116 people based on two meter social distancing. And then we took advantage of some trailers, some scenic trailers to create three stages. You'll see one on the distance. I'll go back to this slide, which was one on the eastern side for Act 3. And this was the trailer that was both Act 1 and Act 4, the interior, the sort of attic apartment that obviously features the heart of Labouin. What was amazing, I've got to say, we could only play to 116 people, but the orchestra, instead of being safely contained within the orchestra pet, agreed to move into our paint shop. We provided appropriate ventilation, obviously we cleaned it up, provided appropriate ventilation. And then Stuart Stratford, the conductor stood, you can just see him in the distance center photograph underneath the orange roller shutter. He's conducting both viewing the orchestra and viewing the stage. We're also some monitors to help relay his conducting to the casts. You know, was it perfect? No. But was it perfect for its time? Absolutely. You know, people were incredibly moved by the performance and by a return to live performance. We learned an awful lot about testing the boundaries of social distancing. The tent, we established that if we kept some of the sides off the tent, then it was effectively an outdoor space, and the regulations meant that we could perform if we were outdoors. So that was us taking our fight, if you like, to the government to say, do you know what, we've got a lot of work we need to do here, we need your help, here's how we think we can find a way around it. One of the other unforeseen perils was the warmth of sitting underneath a clear canopy in a car park. So unusually certainly during rehearsals, many of our cast were much warmer than we'd expected. And the, I should say that the success of Love O.M. in the South car park in 2020 led us to present a much more ambitious staging of Vady's full staff directed by Sir David McVicar. And what was interesting there, I mentioned him because when, when we were discussing another project that was having to be, we had on the pipeline that will now return early next year. When I was discussing this project with Sir David, he looked absolutely bereft, because all his work had been canceled. You know, this is a man who could command the attention of opera companies all around the world, three, four, five year backlog in his diary in terms of when you if you want to book them, you've got to book three, four, five years ahead, depending on the scale of the production bereft his world had stopped. He had absolutely come to a grinding halt. He lives just over the way here in Glasgow, and I was round to see him just to kind of say face to face I'm really sorry but we're going to have to stop this particular project. And then sort of Stuart Stratford and I had pre-planned this if you like, talked about it previously. Listen, I don't suppose Stuart and I are thinking of full staff as an appropriate offering for the car park. I don't suppose you would be interested in directing it and he turned from someone who's incredibly bereft and upset into someone who the light had gone on again. And because David is both an artist as well as a director, he grabbed, I mean not quite the back of a fake packet, but had literally within five minutes done the first blush design for the full staff set, and then started to sketch the culture costumes, which gave us a really enriched production. Interestingly, we were also able to secure a co-production with our friends in Santa Fe. So, whilst I'm not sales manager for Santa Fe Opera, if you find yourself in Santa Fe in June this year, you can be entertained by that particular production. I'm conscious that I'm time bounce I'm just going to press on. I also just want to say that this is a distorted map of Scotland, but it gives you a flavor of where we delivered, sorry, where we're going to deliver our primary schools touring and pop up opera over spring and summer and 22. In the summer just gone by we managed to deliver 190 performances of our pop up shows in 46 communities across Scotland. And it was just brilliant that we were able to take a couple of converted scenery trailers and offer that through them offer the performers shelter and the cast an audience. Sorry, the audiences as you can see here somewhere in the Western Isles were definitely very hardy very resilient incredibly weatherproof cast were safely on stage. On a warmer day. This is what it looks like and we had a trio of Gilbert no five GNS productions. These are about half an hour long. Typically two singers and a rate a couple of instrumentalists, an audience that could go anywhere from 20 to 150 sitting in their bubbles. The singers were Mike obviously because you've got to give everyone a fighting chance, but it was an amazing way of keeping the art form alive providing work for people and absolutely bang in the drum for the opera around the nation. Okay. I think just in closing I want to say I think these images help to illustrate the point that we've come full circle from those noisy exploratory days 400 odd years ago, all the way around to noisy exploratory outdoor days during the pandemic years 2020 to 2022. When we were outdoors we've learned to trust our audiences to join us and they did approved their waterproof their resilient and and very determined to re engage with life performance and all that it means to us. And what it means to us essentially is that you know opera is a life performance as a shared human experience. We bring the joy of singing of music making and storytelling together. We feel incredibly proud of all that we've achieved over this covert time, and not only in pivoting our business model to provide opera performances, but also adapting all of our years of practice to continue actively engaging with our audiences. I think we've amply demonstrated how resilient the art form is, and how keen the audience are to join us. Honestly, there's a great deal of work to be done to encourage our audiences back into theaters and concert halls. So absolutely no room for complacency. But yes, you know, to be honest, I'm most curious about who and what Scottish opera might be over the next 60 years. And I would just like to now close by showing a tiny bit of film footage. Thanks Nicholas. This is a very glamorous assistant is going to stop me being defeated by technology. This is film footage taken backstage during our production of full staff in our South car park in the summer and this is Roland Wood who sang the title role. Welcome to my palatial dressing room. So here we have the fat suit place yourself ladies and gentlemen. I've just accurately made fat suit and delightful woolly socks. So as you can see, so you can see how it is now to hang off the fat suit. I'm ready for my entrance, Mr Deville. It's a lot of hard work. It's a lot of pre-preparation. I mean obviously it's managed all have to be able to read music so you know the score inside out. We work from day one in the rehearsal room. So as the production's created, we learn where the entrances, where the exits of all the cast are, what props they require, what they take on and all this is noted down. And so by the time we get to this stage, we do know it inside out. It's utterly delightful. I'm not just saying it. I really do mean it. It's been a really beautiful thing to be part of, to see that teamwork, to see people having to work together. It's exceptional that Scottish Opera have done this in this space and created something so beautiful and so meaningful. Saturday night when we opened, that feeling of having an audience again was just like nothing else. I definitely had a little teary moment during Acts 3 just thinking how special and truly beautiful and what feels like a great artistic achievement. So it's why we do it. The audience is why we do it. Camera and filming this work for television like we've been doing is lovely and a wonderful way to connect to audiences when we couldn't be making live work. But having an audience in on Saturday night, goodness, there's nothing like it. There's only nothing shifty because I couldn't work out how to turn it off. Anyway, thank you very much for indulging me this evening. Great pleasure to have a chance to speak to you a little bit about opera and Scottish Opera. And I think I'm not going away. No, I'm handing back to you. No way. Right, we're going to have. Thank you, Alex. We now have a five minute interval where people can prepare their questions. We're ready to start the questions. And I'd like to start with some questions from the audience, please. We've got a roving mic. Yes, at the back there. Yes. We will for the zoom. You stand here. You go talking to her. Hold it for me. Excellent. Roughly what's a portion of staff are involved in the musical side, the vocal side, the production side, and the admin side of the opera, because if you go to a cinema, the stars come down and there's half a dozen stars, and there's 5 million other people. Do you need 5 million other people. That's a really good question. Yes, no, yes, no. So to mount a typical production, a new production. I think the question is how many people, what are the degrees of contribution from around the company to putting a typical production on. And, for example, we're doing Benjamin Britain's Midsummer Night's Dream at the moment. We've got a core cast of about 10 or so principles, children's chorus of about 20. There's 50 odd and the orchestra. And there's running team as it were who run the show who've got probably about 40 or so by the time we've done stage crew stage management, weeks costume makeup. And that there's also a team of people who've made the scenery painted the scenery built the costumes made the weeks in this case we've also got some specialist people who installed the equipment for flying the performance up and down. There's a small haulage company that has to move us around. So, I mean, typically speaking, our production of that scar would have about 120 people touring, having had another 40 or 50 people involved at various stages in the making of it. Scottish Opera has a core of about 120 of which 50, 50 or so of those are in the orchestra so that leaves about 70 and that spread relatively evenly across many departments, all of which are very small. So there's a, for want of a better way of listing it there's a small finance HR, a larger marketing incomes and press teams, a fundraising team. We then have music staff. We've got some heads of department across all of our making, you know, scenery props costumes, and we then supplement all of those with the freelance pool, which as I said earlier has been depleted through the film and TV sector but those are the sort of broadly speaking. I mean, it's one of the reasons why opera as an art form is quite hard to get your head into from making point of view is that in some respects the music staff represent all of the kind of learning that is, you know, kind of sits across a 400 year period in terms of their knowledge of scores and composers and music. And on the other hand, you, at the other end of that you've got a digital department within the marketing team who make the little podcast like the one we saw up on screen earlier so we're sitting across 400 years of tradition. One of the things I want to just probably go on to say is that I've always strive to do is to maintain as many of these making jobs in Scotland as possible. I think that we've kind of tried to feed as many young people as we can into our pipeline to ensure that, particularly the costume cutting the scenery making the scenery painting skills, stay alive and well here in Scotland. Does that answer your question. Okay, let's take a question from our zoom audience. Now my fellow Council member going to the back is looking into those for us. Have we got a question. Yes, we have a few here. And first one, what has been the influence of the opera school on the progress of Scottish opera. What's the, what's the pro what's the influence of the opera school on the progress of Scottish opera. Let's get the Alexander Gibson opera school which is contained within the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. It's a very important part of the pipeline preparing young singers for life in the world of opera. We have quite a strong mentoring relationship. We offer Let me go back a bit for a time, we were able to work closely with the opera school to actually present productions where they would provide much of the cast we provide the orchestra and scenery costume staff etc. Sometimes I've moved on that hasn't been possible, but we still maintain a very active interest in the children, young people sorry going into the opera school. We audition them all to understand to see what stage of development they're at. When they are ready and sometimes it's post postgrad, they'll be ready to come into our own emerging artists program which is designed to prepare young singers for life in the world of opera. We also do side by side with the opera school with Stuart a music director runs a small conducting course there. We also have instrumental side by sides with some of their instrumentalists and our orchestra on particular projects, and also many of their production arts, young people come up through various making and running teams. Very strong relationship, fostered by or enhanced by the fact that we are literally neighbors on Hope Street and neighbors on Gershky Road. Thank you question from the audience. Yes, Pat. At the beginning you defined opera partly as telling a story with music. I'd like to ask you might what might sound like a kind of Philistine question. I hope you won't take it that way. But what's the difference then between an opera and the musical. It's a difference between an opera and a musical. That's a good question. I think to an extent the short answer is partly depends on whether you're in the mood for an opera or a musical. I mean in many respects opera musicals inhabit very similar territory. I mean I think it's fair to say that typically to sing opera requires a great deal more vocal skill and preparation. And certainly to play for an opera often requires a good deal of musical skill and preparation because typically it's an orchestra 3040 5060 70, whereas many of the musicals inhabit a world due to financial reasons of simple keyboards piano drums base, etc. I think the very best musicals absolutely across the boundaries between either shallow or derivative storytelling versus some of the great emotional pull and power the night at the opera. Someone like Stephen Sondheim, an amazing kind of composer who straddles the territory between the two really effectively really well. I think, as I say, I think it's partly a matter of taste it's partly a matter of technical experience and expertise as a performer. Yeah, and it's partly the complexity of the, of what's required of you as a performer or a musician. Does that give you an answer that works. Okay. Another question for or zoom audience. What is your view of cultural appropriation. Should madam butterfly be Japanese. I presume the other question is the character madam butterfly, but for the character is Japanese indeed in madam butterfly. I think it's interesting. That's a question that we are beginning to bump into much more frequently. I think for a long time there was an expectation that an acceptance that particularly if the voice was right. Nothing else really matters. In other words, if the artists could sing the role. That's what mattered most of all. We've then, as I alluded to my talk moves to an era, perhaps, where the directors have an expectation of a degree of various military which has led to performers perhaps, for example Mimi is often now cast as someone who looks as though they could be dying as opposed to someone who might not be. We've also moved now into a world where actually questions of cultural identity, cultural appropriation, featuring very much alive and well and I think it's actually a really big question that we as an art form, along with all of the other performing arts need to be asking ourselves. Can you present madam butterfly. Could you be doing it if you don't have an appropriate Japanese woman to sing the role. It kind of presumes you can find someone to sing the role, but it's all vocally, but also, there is, there's a wider question in my view which is the opera is not only about cultural appropriation and cultural identity, but it's also about terrible sexual behaviors, and to what extent can they ensure they be represented on stage. And so the challenge for us going forward, and certainly we're doing our best to meet this head on is to ask ourselves of every opera we're looking to present. What is in it that is that either, you know, has attitudes or troops that need to be changed addressed tweaked edited out. And also in doing all of this, how can we still tell these amazing stories how can we still tell and bring these amazing operas to the stage. So I think the short answer is it's a very alive question. Do we have the perfect answer to know. I mean, you also for example madam butterfly have really interesting cultural issues, for example. We sometimes think of that part of the world as being a bit homogenous. And actually, it's frequently done that a woman of Korean, perhaps or Chinese descent is cast as madam butterfly. Actually, from that part of the world is that the right answer. Probably not. So, one of the, one of the approaches for example that our cousins at Welsh National Opera took. We recently presented madam butterfly, but set in a sort of dystopian future sometime in the 2030s, which was to do with all the boundaries being done as it were, and that enabled them to bring to the stage of production that wasn't about race in that particular way. But then one of the challenges is madam butterfly. The reason she commits suicide is this question of honor. And if you don't have the cultural setting of honor in place. What is it then that propels her to her death. And, and I to be honest, I'm not sure that production answered that question, but I thought it was a very interesting reading of the piece. That question from the audience. I think Trisha someone in the middle there. Thank you. I think it was you. Just picking up on the point before about musicals in theater. This has changed a lot. I mean, there's a lot more music now in theater, which has been into which has been brought in for sudden change in atmosphere. Do you think the same thing might happen in opera there might be more, for example, spoken voice without it descending into music musicals. I think. Yes, I think the role of spoken voice and or a set a team in contemporary productions does feature. It is one of the tools that often are the young writers or young composers play with. I think sort of trends and contemporary composition is actually the absence of singing for groups. It's often this person sings then that person responds as opposed to writing for a chorus. So one of the things we're trying to encourage composers to do is to be bolder in writing for a larger group of people. It's not an easy question to answer because so many of the individual new commissions will have elements or shades or nuances of this and evidence. Thank you. Great. Have you got a question. Yep. So we've talked about the importance of commissioning new work. How do you go about selecting commissioning and producing a new opera? That's a good question. If I heard it correctly the questions how do we go about commissioning new work. That would be quite a long answer, but I'll do my best to stay moderate link to that question I wanted to ask which is, if you have a writer who'd like to get involved in opera what would they do, you know. Okay, so I mean, much of this remains relatively informal as it were. I mean, certainly when we were doing the 515 projects in 2008, 9 and 10. It started because a particular composer came to me knowing that the door was relatively wide open a particular composer came to me and said, do you know I've got this idea, would you be interested in thinking about it. It led me to developing the thought process if you like that was, if we as an opera company bet the family farm on one new full length opera, without knowing how developed their writing composing skills are, then that's too big a bit for an opera company because it's just too hard to do from the get go. So, I then thought what if we created a safe space where that's five productions feature 15 minutes, and that led to conversations, some that I initiated others as the word got round. So writers and composers came to us including, interestingly, in conversation with Craig Armstrong, film composer based here in Glasgow, very interested in finding his way into this art form. And the idea he expressed to me seemed like an idea that someone like writer Ian Rankin would be interested in talking about. And so, one of the happy introductions was between Ian and Craig. And that was a sort of, you know, trying to think about what sort of writer could meet would work with composer. The most successful pairing has been with composer Stuart McCrae and writer Louise Walsh, who went on from a five 15 piece called remembrance staff I've got it correct then to do ghost patrol, then on to devil inside and then finally that started with a 15 minute idea, then they built their skills to becoming a 30 minute moved on to an hour and finally a two hour opera. If anyone put this out there if anyone has any ideas around or desire to get involved with either writing or composing, just come and see me the door is always open. But I would say it's almost impossible to present, you know, a work of an epic scale don't try and set no be dictum music, for example, you know, have an idea that is around essentially a domestic drama, you know, two or three people. Talking about that he's been back earlier. What is that essentially an operatic forms essentially an incredibly intense domestic drama, the risk of being reductivist, but you know that that's what matters that's the thing that captures an audience's interest. It also enables through the use of music all of the, all of the codes and subtleties to be conveyed without having to have lots and lots of words. So short, simple ideas, fewer characters, particularly if you can avoid getting to engage with the chorus of the outset helps save the money. So the smaller the idea but the stronger the idea, the better a chance we get of getting it staged and we do it always we always have one or two or three new ideas in the pipeline. And it's amazing how many of them come from. Maybe, you know, a wee idea arrives on an email or a wee idea turns up in a face to face conversation somewhere. Yeah, I know that sounds a bit informal and a bit kind of anecdotal a little bit car crashy. I guess it is, but at the moment we don't have in the UK there isn't really a formal or breakfast or breakfast or composing framework, other than the really good work going on the Guild Hall School of Music in London. This is a question about capturing the young. I fell in love with the idea of opera. When I, I don't know, I must be about 10, and I watched the great Caruso, and Mario lands are pegging out at the very end, seeing from Pagliacci. I've never become very sophisticated. I don't particularly go in for modern opera, you know, maybe corn gold would be the would be my limit, but I wonder about your school productions. Do you go for melody or drama. I mean what kind of repertoire do you give to the kids to try and, you know, sell the idea of opera to them. It's a good question. So, I think in my talk I talked about visiting roughly 100 primary schools every year. There is no pre existing body of work that we can bring to the primary schools. So every year we commission for every two years probably we commission a new 30 minute 40 minute piece for approximately 100 school children to perform. It's not really the combination of melody and drama, but we try to find a subject that could be environmental. It could be. We've done a piece around introducing children to China. There was a piece around cop 26 that we created. It's normally presented what is created to be about 100 kids divided into three groups as it were. They bring appropriate costumes and small props with us. They learn the music in advance and then on the day three or four of Scottish opera team are in the room they each take team each teach them the appropriate moves to kind of big crowd moves and bring to life these short steps, but they work because they are all about easy melody, but yet quite sophisticated writing around quite complex subjects, but appropriately aimed at the sort of P3s P4s that we that we perform them with. We're determined to get in front of as many school kids as possible. And we, you know, noting that some of the schools we do this work and it can easily be 20 or 30 or 40 languages spoken within that school so for many of the children involved in these performances that is, you know, they're, you know, very often the only introduction to our art form, because it's not necessarily something they would experience within their own households. So we definitely determined to spread it across as many of the local authorities as we can every year. Have we any more questions. Yeah, if I can combine two here. What makes a great opera, and what opera do you recommend for a first time opera goer. So good question what makes a great opera. I mean, sometimes at the risk of being a little facetious, a great opera is the one we're doing just now. That facetiousness aside, that's partly because that is obviously the opera that is foremost in your mind because that's the one we're seeing every day in rehearsals we're seeing it on stage with experiencing the audience reaction to it. I think what for me what makes a great opera is a performance where myself, and I include myself as one of the audience, where we go away, not only impressed by the quality of the scene music making staging but also where it touches us somewhere inside. And, you know, what is a great opera for me is not a great opera for anyone of you there because it's partly who we are as human beings and where we are in various stages in our lives. Whether we've got the car park without getting irritated, you know, it's all the stuff that comes to being in a theater, or indeed seeing it on the screen but when we get it right, that particular opera can be a great opera. And, you know, the three, the three great three top 10 operas that I mentioned earlier the Traviato, the Carmen and the love om, why are they great operas, because they are, I believe they are stories about real human beings about real travails that many of us are all of us experience, set to some of the most amazing music you're ever going to bump into, you know, and I think that that combination is what makes a great performance. It's a good opera to start with. What we've, so I'm not going to answer that directly, but I'm going to say that what we found with our under 26 audience is that they more often come to the better known titles. And when we get it right they come away, really pleased with that experience. I think I said, a particular opera that really is the great the right place to start as love om, because it's about young people. It's incredibly recognizable tunes the story is incredibly compelling. And, you know, as one of its virtues it's relatively short, and it's amazing how much that also appeals to people now. Okay, there's a gentleman there. That's a simple question. You mentioned funding from the taxpayer, roughly what percentage of your funding does come from the taxpayer. The second part is a bit more complex. You mentioned and very well covered very well 400 years of opera, and almost all of the operas you've mentioned are either French, German, or Italian. Whereas in the last 100 years we've had popular music, and it is almost uniquely sung in English. Albert Springsteen, The Beatles, Queen are all sung in English. Eurovision Song Contest over half the songs are in English. Why do we not have more English operas or sung in English operas? Yeah, that's quite a big question. Go back a bit to answer the first part. Our funding from the Scottish government is so when I started 16 years ago, it was roughly a little over 80% of our funding was from the Scottish government and the rest of it was earned income. These days we're more 65% subsidy and 35% odd percent and income. These things are never you can ever pour concrete on that particular ratio because depends on how well we do in fundraising box office sales and income from the rental of our productions. And obviously also, you know, Scottish government funding has regrettably only had one trajectory which is some steadily downhill in real term certainly. And so, but we certainly endeavour to pull as much funding together as we can from a source of all sources we can get our hands on to squeeze as hard as we can to push as many opera killer jewels out of it as is humanly possible. Second question about English. The use of English language but particularly across opera versus perhaps more popular music. There is a lot more opera written in English than perhaps might be immediately obvious. I'm certainly here in the UK works of Benjamin Britain, you know obviously feature prominently but I think we then in the UK went through a period where there was opera composed and sort of the latter part of the mid to latter part of the 20th century so there isn't as big a body of operas written in English. I guess every other country will typically write in the operas in their own language. So if you're a new composer in France you're right in French typically Dutch, Dutch, etc. But interestingly, popular music, English is always the typically the language chosen because it's the most one of the most universal languages. And so people will write from whatever nationality in English, knowing that it gives them the best chance of getting their work heard seen and sold. I think is the answer to that but I'm on slightly. I wouldn't, I wouldn't absolutely hold me to that but that's what I think. Last question. Let's think this will have to be the last. Whether you see any differences in the climate for opera in New Zealand and in Scotland. That's a good question. Do I see any differences in the climate for opera compared between New Zealand and Scotland. Okay, the big difference is that for some really bizarre crazy reason opera finds it very hard to get any government support in New Zealand. So when I ran New Zealand opera that was on about 14 and a half percent subsidy and the rest of it was earned income. So every fortnight it was held trying to get to the wages, and you just knew whether you're selling opera or not what the financial outcome was going to be. I think, indeed interestingly, but one of the things I learned from my time in New Zealand was that actually, we could be much braver about commissioning new work. I think that was one of the energies that I suppose that I brought with me here that set and train the 515 story. So, I think audiences in general around New Zealand enjoy the art form as much as they do here. One of the other interesting differences that turn of the 19th of the 20th century was a great deal of celebration of civic pride. There were actually a number of thousands opera houses were built. And when you go small scale touring in New Zealand, you go on a much larger scale than perhaps you might do in some of the communities here. So the world of amateur opera operator musicals is incredibly alive there, as indeed many of the program companies are here. Lots of similarities, huge financial differences. It is enthusiastically received there as it is here but it's just a tougher thing to keep going there. So answer your question. Yeah, good. But with that, I think it's time for us to thank you Alex I think it's been a fascinating talk you've, you've had to cover a huge range of issues and it's not easy to do that, and it can't be easy to do your job I'm sure. Thank you for bringing all these things to create as you say the magic of opera. So I'd like us all to thank you very much.