A toast to local heroes

The Sloans Project, written by the Glasgow-based composer Gareth Wiliams with librettist David Brock, and directed by Kirkcubrightshire-born James Robert Carson, will be the first production by New Opera In Scotland Events (NOISE) which is based in the East End of the city and whose aim is to break down perceived barriers to the art form by performing in novel spaces.

The 90-minute promenade opera will be performed over three floors of the opulent Sloans pub and restaurant, which was built in 1797 and pre-dates the Argyll Arcade that surrounds it by some 30 years. Cockfights and poker were popular pastimes in Morrisons courtyard outside, while Burns’ Meetings were held in the rooms upstairs and the rich and powerful would entertain their mistresses. The two buildings are inter-related in the social history of both middle- and working-class Glasgow, and while Sloans forms the site-specific backdrop to the drama, the Argyll Arcade also has a significant part to play.

“Entire lives were played out here through birth, marriage and death,” explains Carson. “These are universal themes, but they have a special resonance in Sloans. For years ordinary people have bought their engagement rings in the Arcade, come to Sloans to celebrate, get married in the upstairs Ballroom, hold their children’s christenings, hold ceilidhs and then have their wakes in one of the snugs. Yet the story of Sloans has never really been told before now.”

When the idea for the opera was first mooted by Gareth Williams last year, the production team – including co-artistic directors Carson and Scottish mezzo-soprano Arlene Rolph – had to think of how to research the material. Carson, who has worked at Glyndebourne, Aldeburgh and Scottish Opera and has studied Noh theatre in Japan, decided to invite members of the public to contribute their stories and memories of Sloans to him by email. To start the ball rolling, he would sit in the pub and approach punters to speak to him.

“It was a bit daunting, like being a market researcher,” says the director, who lives in Dennistoun. “People talked about Sloans as childhood memories, or as emotional snapshots, or passed on stories in the oral tradition. It was fantastic. It was like they saw this exercise as a validation of their lives. It sometimes felt like being in the psychiatrist’s chair.

“Even if they didn’t have much to say they would steer me to people who did. Through them and through emails I received, I got in touch with the people who are now either actors in the opera or whose stories formed part of the libretto itself.”

One of these is Denise Goldman, who discovered her father had been captured in a 1950s photograph of an outdoor dance that now hangs in the first-floor restaurant. “She told me how happy she had been to see her dad dancing because he had become lame in later life.” She is represented as the 1950s Lady in the Game of Chance acting scene that takes place in an upstairs snug – the only scene that is not sung.

Another character is based on Corlinda Lee, the Queen of Gypsies who is buried at the Glasgow Necropolis and whose grave is regularly visited by fans who make a wish and leave coins. “Corlinda’s connection with Sloans is that it would have been a place where she would hold one of her Gypsy Balls and tell people’s fortunes.”

And then there’s the street performer Patrick Feeny, or Old Malabar, who in the 1800s would wear a headpiece with a cup attached in which he’d catch a heavy ball. His nose was distorted from all the injuries he sustained from missed catches.

But Carson’s favourite is the legendary Argyll Arcade security guard Tam James, who was the subject of a drawing by Joan Eardley and who was “a repository of stories” for Carson. “He knew all the landlords as well as the police, and would make his own wine in the basement which he’d sell on the black market.”

While the actors mingle with the audience, who might be past punters, the opera itself is performed by a cast of just five, including Scots tenor Jamie MacDougall, Kilmarnock-born baritone Paul Keohone, and Scots mezzo sopranos Cheryl Forbes and Arlene Rolph, and Scottish Opera Emerging Artist Miranda Sinani. Orchestral music will be provided by a violin, cello, harp, accordion and piano – all portable enough to follow the drama as it unfolds.

Starting in the ground-floor bar, this features a young couple who are in Sloans celebrating their engagement, as was tradition. The action then moves upstairs and splits into three independent but interrelated scenes: Game of Chance is in one snug, where audience are invited to shuffle the cards and the actors read out anecdotes and collected stories. “The idea here is that you never knew what was going to happen when you entered the pub,” explains Carson.

In the other snug is Country Song scene, where a wake is taking place in front of a body on the bar (taken from a real-life anecdote where the coffin was too wide and was left outside on the stair). When one of the friends puts a coin in the jukebox, Sinani sings the Country Song – a beautiful, melodic and haunting piece. Meanwhile, in the restaurant across the corridor, a scene entitled Chopin’s Ghost, about a landlady embezzling funds to buy jewellery, is performed.

“The landlady’s ghost is said still to be in this room, together with a pianist who hanged himself. Chopin visited Glasgow around that time, and played the Panoptican at the Trongate just down the road. As he died soon after that visit, we tied all the stories together in one scene.”

Then it’s the dramatic interactive wedding scene upstairs in the Grand Ballroom, where the Old Man – sung by Dennistoun-born MacDougall – returns from his first appearance in scene one.

The rehearsal period is only ten days, and began on Monday. The score and the libretto are literally just written – and it’s this freshness that excites Carson. “I’ve seen the score but haven’t heard it yet,” he says. “And we still have to decide whether the libretto can or should be sung in the vernacular. What, anyway, is standard Glaswegian? Part of our job is to see how far we can take that and adapt it. It’s very exciting. It’s not like directing an opera, it’s more like getting ready for a big party. The spirit of Sloans is very welcoming and part of the joy of this project is making it about a particular set of people in a particular place.

“There’s something very appealing about working like this. It’s an interesting way to tell the story of Sloans, and to give a voice to the people who otherwise don’t have a voice.”

The Sloans Project forms part of the Merchant City Festival and runs from July 20-24. www.noiseopera.com