Bridgetower - A Fable of 1807

Published Monday 9 July 2007 at 09:30 by Edward Bhesania

The City of London Festival have taken a chance in commissioning an opera from jazz pianist Julian Joseph, and in many ways it hasn’t paid off. The subject is interesting enough: George Bridgetower (1768-1860), virtuoso violinist and son of an ex-slave father. The opera follows the young Bridgetower as he is presented to the Prince of Wales and is taken under royal patronage. There’s a distinct sound of the musicals as the scenario hovers around Bridgetower’s love for the slave girl Mary Prince (the first black woman to publish a book in England), though the climax relates not to newfound love, but with a bicentennial nod to the 1807 Abolition of Slavery Act.

There’s potential here in the clash of Regency Windsor and the black underclass, and in Joseph’s jazz band as opera orchestra, but Joseph’s series of songs and choruses  though individually appealing stunts the development of narrative and, alongside Mike Phillips’s libretto attempts to cover too many bases: is this about the slave trade, Bridgetower’s social rise, a love story, or Bridgetower’s shortlived friendship with Beethoven (in which role Joseph himself makes an entertaining piano-pastiche cameo).

It all leads to a rambling evening that doesn’t quite gel. But Joseph makes fine use of a focused and well-directed LSO St Luke’s Community Choir; and a great band with a naturally leading role for the brilliant jazz violinist Chris Garrick. What really saves the evening are the voices and stage artistry of Cleveland Watkiss, the adult Bridgetower whose every phrase oozes instinctive musicianship, and Jacqui Dankworth, the persecuted yet feisty Mary Prince: both were seamless, inspiring bridges between jazz and classical, black and white.