Beware the woman who is bored, cautions Welsh-woman Helen Field, the opera singer who is to sing the title role of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, by Dimitri Shostakovich, at the upcoming Irish premiere at the Gaiety Theatre. In this Slavic version of the story, Lady Macbeth murders a range of people in her life "out of sheer frustration", you see. She was deeply misunderstood, it seems. Ah, yes, like many of us (women).
Dieter Kaegi, artistic director of Opera Ireland, calls for ciunas while the cast and crew of Opera Ireland's up-coming shows in November are introduced to each other. Regina Nathan is looking forward to singing the lead role of Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini. She looks to Juremir Vieira, the tenor from Portoalegra in Brazil, who will sing opposite her. "I play the bastardo, but she loves me, it is the usual story," he says.
Others at the drinks party include Cathal Garvey, the chorus master from Cork, who speaks fluent Russian; Georgii Ishakian, the Armenian director of Madama Butterfly, and the French singer Patricia Fernandez, whose little son Pablo Lemonnier (almost two) will go far if he chooses to be an opera singer, 'cos he can certainly reach those high notes! "Perhaps a conductor," says his mother, looking at her son wave his arm.