The Parlour, an opera in one act by Grace Williams, will be released on 4 July.
The Arts Council’s Welsh Committee approached Grace Williams in 1959 with the offer of a commission to write a one-act opera. The composer turned to the French satirist Guy de Maupassant’s savagely funny short story En Famille in which the apparent demise of a cantankerous matriarch uncovers the greed of family members. She wrote her own libretto for The Parlour, and transferred the setting from the banks of the Seine to a Victorian seaside townhouse living room in 1870.
The two scenes frame a brief interlude and reveal Grace Williams’ skill at writing for the theatre. It’s a fast paced piece with compact arias, ensembles, recitatives and choruses. Grace Williams said of it: ‘There’s quite a lot to say in a short time. So whatever else I’ll be accused of, I hardly think anyone could say that the opera drags’.
- Grace Williams’s life and music is the subject of Donald MacLeod’s Composer of the Week due to be broadcast at 4pm from 7 to 11 July..
Her music was also featured on BBC Radio3 on 13 June when a performance of her 2nd Symphony was given by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by Martyn Brabbins. This broadcast can be heard on BBC Sounds.