Robert Poulton

news, singers
Grief is a strange beast. It fogs your mind, grabs your throat and strangles your heart. But through all the pain, strands of memory push towards you and start to join together until they begin to form cogent wholes. All my strands, every single one of them, remind me of what a rare man was Rob Poulton – a lovely, loveable man, and I, like so many others, genuinely loved him. He was a rare constant. It didn’t matter if I saw him or didn’t see him; I knew that – if I could get hold of the bugger – he would be a friend in good times and bad.…

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More old stuff

1 Commentopera, singers, writings on music
Here’s another piece I started cobbling together ten years ago. I’m not sure why – it wasn’t for a specific publication – and I never finished it, but in the light of ENO’s newest UNDRESS campaign to get more young people through its doors, it seemed particularly pertinent to post it now. Don’t get me wrong; I love it when young people “get” opera but every young person I have ever known understands all too well when they’re being patronised. And besides, I was at ENO a couple of nights and the audience was peppered with young people who are passionate about the medium. The fact is that box office takings are down and any old publicity stunt will do in a storm, which I would think is the main engine under the UNDRESS campaign.
Oh, and yes, I see I make yet another analogy with food……

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Old news

1 Commentopera, singers, writings on music

A decade or so ago I used to write the odd column for Private Eye. I wasn’t the only contributor writing about music and opera so don’t go delving into the archives and think that I was behind any and every story that was being published. Chances are it was someone else. And don’t go asking me whether I wrote such-and-such and article about so-and-so because I’m simply not going to tell you. …

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Call me Rusty

1 Commentsingers, travel

“Lead by example” they always say. Not that anyone is asking me to lead anything but if a young singer came to me for advice, amidst much spluttering and umming and aahing I’m pretty sure one of the things I’d say is “make you sure you sing at least twice a week, just to keep everything in shape, especially when you’re not working.”
Yes, well, easier said than done. Especially at my age when, idle for a morning, listening to some cricket on the radio is infinitely more appealing that sitting down for half an hour with Mr Vaccai and his worthy but dull exercises. And once the rot sets in and you find you haven’t sung a proper note for two weeks, the task seems pointless, uphill and Herculean. You’ll get back on the horse in time for the next job, you tell yourself.…

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