ENO Harewood Artist Samantha Price discusses her fifth week of creating the role of Perdita in a world premiere from ENO’s composer-in-residence Ryan Wigglesworth, The Winter‘s Tale.

Olivier-Award winning actor Rory Kinnear makes his directorial debut with this compelling new interpretation of Shakespeare’s tale of love, loss and reconciliation.

See The Winter’s Tale at the London Coliseum from 27 February – 14 March 2017

Here,Sam discusses week 5 of rehesals for the world premiere of The Winter’s Tale, talking about the last few days at ENO rehearsal space, Lilian Baylis House, and moving over to the London Coliseum, as well as fine tuning each section of the brand new opera.

‘The end of week 5 marks the end of our time at Lilian Baylis House where we have been rehearsing so far. From next week onwards, we’re in the theatre for real.’

‘On Monday and Tuesday, we went through each section in turn , fine tuning things and adding some finesse. On Wednesday and Thursday we did 2 studio runs, which just means that you start at the beginning and keep going to the end like a proper run. You don’t stop to go over anything – you try to see what it feels like to do the whole thing without stopping. It’s always quite nice to see that for the first time. It gives you a better idea of how it’s looking and the overall shape of the opera’

‘On Wednesday the chorus joined and for the scenes that they weren’t in, they acted like the audience for us. I particularly enjoyed when you could see the performance pride step up a gear in everyone! The responses seem positive – touch wood! We’re ready to step up to the next level of using the actual props and costumes and the actual set to see what challenges they present!’

‘On Friday we had the second and final Sitzprobe with the orchestra, which I always love. That again throws it’s own challenges because when you get used to hearing the piano in rehearsal rooms you get used to hearing the music in a certain way… and then all of  asudden with the orchestra, it’s a whole new ballgame. You have to try and identify which instrument in the orchestra is maybe playing a particular phrase or melody that you’re listening out for.’

‘The orchestra is sounding so great! It’s very exciting and I can’t wait for you guys to hear them.’

‘You also feel slightly contemplative at this stage – you feel happy with what you’ve done so far and the team has been so lovely to work with. It makes us very protective of the piece at this stage. You just want to do it justice and I hope Rory and Ryan are happy with what we’ve produced. We’re the first team to create this work and you just hope that it gets off to a good start.’

‘I can’t wait for next week and to meet who will be doing my hair and make-up with me because you usually build up quite a nice bond with whoever sets you up to get ready for the show.’

‘So lots of challenges ahead – I think there will be lots of tweaking of little bits for timings of things and working with the real props, so challenges ahead but very much looking forward to it!’