Maria Stuarda Programme Book 2022

ANNA DEVIN
Company. My first professional opera!
I remember being petrified about forgetting
what I had to do. It was quite a big deal to be
with all these professionals.
I didn’t know anything, except how to sing.
I was worried about the fact that I sometimes
had to put furniture in different places on the
stage. That something wouldn’t be in the right
place. And what would I do if it wasn’t there?
It happened one night. There was supposed to
be this chair for the duet between Damigella
and Valletto. It was quite a sexy duet, and I was
supposed to put whipped cream on myself and
all of that nonsense. I came on stage and the
chair wasn’t there! Needless to say, my natural
ability came out and we got on with it and made
it up. Something similar happened when I was
making my debut in Covent Garden. When
you’re in the moment your animal instinct, your
natural instinct, overrides the power of
the thinking mind.
WHAT WAS THE BEST OPERA-RELATED
ADVICE YOU EVER GOT?
Ann Murray came into the academy when I was
a student. Her master-classes really stick out
in my head. She was so frank. She’s amazing.
She said to me, 80 per cent of the time you
won’t be singing on a good day. You’ll be lucky
if 20 per cent of the time are your best days. So,
really, you have to learn to sing when you’re not
having a good day. And that’s what makes you
good at being a professional. It’s so true. You
get a handful of days where you happen to line
up physically, vocally, mentally and happen to
have a performance on the same day. And I’m
pretty sure it was Gráinne Dunne, doing Lieder
coaching, who said to me, whatever you do,
don’t ever sing on your capital. You’ve got to
always keep some in reserve. You should never
be singing on your capital as a singer, ever.
Because then you’re doing too much and you’ll
never get through life as a singer.
WHAT IS THE MOST ANNOYING
MISCONCEPTION ABOUT OPERA?
That it’s expensive, and it’s only for the elite.
The most hilarious one I always feel is the idea
that you have to be fat to do it when, nowadays,
it’s the complete opposite. Another one is that
people who don’t know a lot about opera don’t
understand that it’s like any other artform or
any other entertainment, in that there are so
many different types of story, so many different
types of music, so many different types of
singer. If you’ve gone to one performance and
you hate it, that doesn’t mean that you’re going
to hate all opera. That’s like saying, OK, I went
to the cinema and I didn’t enjoy the film, so I’m
never going to the cinema again.
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