Steve Pratt catches up with singer Emma Ralph, who returns to York Grand Opera House tomorrow night with a Second World War operatic version of Cinderella, called Cendrillon

EMMA Ralph featured as a singer in University of York Opera Society’s production of Don Giovanni. Tomorrow she returns to the Grand Opera House, but in a different role. She’s directing Cendrillon, the story of Cinderella with music by Jules Massenet.

The project dates back to the beginning of the year when Timothy Ferguson, a friend in the music department at York University, asked if she was interested in directing an opera. It was an area of music that she loved, having grown up with classical music and been in school shows in Portsmouth where she grew up.

Emma, 19, is in the first year of her BA studies in writing, directing and performance in the university’s theatre, film and television department. She and Ferguson, a third year student and musical director on a production of The Marriage Of Figaro, had to pitch the idea to the opera society and then chose from a list of operas.

She liked Cendrillon – which is being sung in English – because she believed the music was so much more accessible to a wider audience. “It’s not just boring exposition. It’s much more French and really, really beautiful musically, especially some of the fairy music,” she says.

“Also there’s a much bigger chorus than in many other operas and we were interested in working with a large cast of about 40, including dancers.

There’s also a 47-piece orchestra. Everyone is a university student but the singers tend to be semiprofessional with a lot going to the Royal Academy to continue singing studies.”

She doesn’t have a lot of directing experience apart from school productions, including an allfemale staging of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale.

“I performed in Don Giovanni at the Grand Opera House as a classical singer and it’s a great experience. It’s great for the principals who want to become singers to have it on their CV. Directing was something I wanted to learn how to do at a big venue,” she says.

“We want to reach out to the whole family as well to introduce children to opera so the production is a lot more visual and it’s a story they know.”

She has put in a new subplot to frame the story - the non-singing role of a Second World War soldier who comes across the story of Cinderella in a bookshop and reminisces about his wartime romance. It’s told through his eyes and takes the audience back to 1940s Britain.

The fairies become nurses caring for the wounded and the men are soldiers on the brink of going to fight in the war. But Cinderella still goes to the ball with the help of a fairy godmother.

  • Cendrillon: York Grand Opera House, tomorrow, 7pm. Box office 0844-8713024 and atgticketscom/york