The Silent Twins

Sunday Times journalist Marjorie Wallace met young arsonists June and Jennifer Gibbons in Broadmoor in the 1980s. She discovered twins who wouldn’t talk to the world, but whose writings and literary imagination were vivid, strange and articulate.

Wallen and De Angelis’ tragic-comic opera bring to brilliant life the twins’ secret world of pulp fiction and killer dolls.

Errollyn Wallen’s opera follows her successes in short operas at the Royal OperaHouse and at Sadler’s Wells.  April de Angelis is the librettist of Jonathan Dove’s Flight and Pig.

Music: Errollyn Wallen

Text: April de Angelis

Conductor: Tim Murray

Almeida Ensemble

Director: Martin Constantine

Designer: Peter McKintosh

Lighting Design: Neil Austin

Cast: Marie Angel, Alison Crookendale, Matthew Sharp, Talise Trevigne, Andrew Rees and La Verne Williams.

PRESS REVIEWS

"Two remarkable performances from Alison Crookendale as Jennifer and Talise Trevigne as June... the opera is an unequivocal hit" 4 stars The Guardian    read full review

"Wallen's jazzy riffs and snappy refrains bring comic brio...to the pulp fiction domain of the twins' imagination" The Times read full review

"Wallen's music - skilfully wrought and freely idiom-crossing.  The delicately keening wind writing where the sisters declare their love for each other is deeply affecting" The Stage read full review

"Alison Crookendale and Talise Trevigne as the twins find exactly the right balance of love and hate and sound gorgeous.  La Verne Williams is superb as their mother and Tim Murray conducts with flair"  Metro

By arrangement with Peters Edition

Production supported by Columbia Foundation, San Francisco