Opera podcast: Sarah Connolly

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Edward Seckerson talks to the acclaimed British mezzo Sarah Connolly as she prepares the title role in Donizett's battle royal of rival queens Maria Stuarda.

Her return to Opera North in the bel canto role of her choice will be one of the highlights of the UK opera season and in this revealing podcast we gain fascinating insight into her extensive preparation and "anatomization" of the roles she performs - right down to the fine detailing here of Mary's temperament and bearing and even her height. What is going through her head in the moments before the "confrontation" which in reality never actually took place? What finally provoked her in the moment she floors Elizabeth I with her "royal bastard" insult? And what must have she been feeling as they built the scaffold outside her prison room at Fotheringay Castle? Connolly leaves nothing unexplored. The inside of her score is a written chronicle of what is required to get inside Mary's head...before she loses it.





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Music by kind permission of Decca Records

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