Music Theatre since 1990 - Schott Music

Synopsis
The Silver Tassie, Turnage’s second acknowledged opera, is on a much larger scale than his first,
Greek. Based on the play by Sean O’Casey written in 1927, it is set at the time of the Great War
(World War I) and its title, referring to a footballing trophy, comes from a Scottish song text by
Robert Burns ‘Go fetch to me a pint o’ wine, an’ fill it in a silver tassie; that I may drink before I
go, a service to my bonnie lassie’.
Harry Heegan (23) is a local hero - a soldier on leave from the Great War, and a renowned footballer.
An only child, he lives with his parents (both in their 60s), having grown up close to the
girl next door, Susie. In the flat above is a volatile young couple, Mrs Foran and her husband
Teddy. The other main roles are Harry’s glamorous girlfriend, Jessie, and his best friend, Barney.
Triumphant after a footballing success and winning the cup (‘The Silver Tassie’) for his team,
he leaves for the front. The second act, a darkly expressionist vision of war, is cast for male
voices (boys and men) only. In the second half of the opera, Harry is in a wheelchair, Teddy is
blind and Jessie has deserted Harry for Barney. The final act, in which dance music plays almost
continuously, brings the tragi-comedy to a poignant and moving conclusion, as Harry and Teddy
set off to face the future.
The Silver Tassie
01.04.2000 English National Opera
“Conceived specifically for the resources of a metropolitan company such as ENO – big orchestra,
men’s and boy’s choruses and no fewer than 12 named solo parts – The Siver Tassie is in that
sense Turnage’s ‘Peter Grimes’, and the rapturous acclaim which greeted the composer and his
librettist at their curtain-call on the opening night suggested that their opera might well have the
kind of future as a repertory piece that Britten’s has enjoyed in the last 30 years or so.
In tackling Sean O’Casey’s dark, pessimistic anti-war play, Turnage and Holden have chosen a
drama with Brittenesque resonances, and although Turnage’s music sounds nothing like Britten, he
has learned from the older British composer’s sense of dramatic pacing, his ‘symphonic’ use of the
orchestra and a vocal style which is basically lyrical, singable, grateful to its performers.”
(Opera, April 2000)
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