Despite many setbacks, John O'Flynn's new opera company is set to shine in Cork's year as Capital of Culture in 2005, writes Mary Leland.
When Ernest Blythe asked John O'Flynn if he could sing, the young aspiring actor responded with half an aria from Rigoletto, in lame Italian. It was the only half he knew, but then and ever since Rigoletto has been his favourite opera, even though his term with the Abbey Theatre was, like the aria, a short one. A car-crash kept him out of work for his first few months and then, in defence of his notion of the "principles of art", the high-minded youngster refused (despite the tuition of his uncle Father Christy O'Flynn of The Loft fame) to take an audition in Irish and was let go.
There's something of that almost fool-hardy high-mindedness to John O'Flynn still. The recent announcement that he has rounded up more than the usual suspects with the intention of starting an opera company in Cork - its inauguration on February 2nd was timed for the lead-up to Cork's year as European Capital of Culture in 2005 - is a reminder of the enthusiasm which drove his career from his father's farm at Kilbarry near Cork city to operatic, recital and teaching engagements throughout Europe. He brought it all back home on numerous occasions, singing six operas (including Rigoletto) with the Dublin Grand Opera Society and making several appearances at Wexford.
His professional CV is wide-ranging, given that, as a basso cantante, he had to wait, as he says tactfully, until he got older before the big parts came along. In the meantime, there were studies in London with Lorenzo Medea and in Rome with Paolo Silveri, nearly three years at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia and an appearance in London in the first concert performance of Gershwin's Porgy and Bess conducted by the 21-year-old Simon Rattle. Other engagements followed through the years, many of them in Germany, where he also taught at the University of Oldenburg
It was an exciting time, with visits home for the Cork City Opera founded by Pat Dawson and Tom Donnelly, an enterprise which, sadly, only lasted for three years. That disappointment on its own wouldn't be accepted as a warning now, perhaps, had it not been followed by another attempt led by John himself in association with Donal O'Callaghan. Son of the late founder of the Cork Youth Orchestra and college lecturer Michael O'Callaghan, Donal proved to be both a sensitive musician and a dynamic conductor and choral director. Setting up the Irish Operatic Repertory Company in 1987, and employing visiting soloists and guest directors such as Cathal McCabe, the two men worked together until 1994, establishing a choral education scheme under FÁS as the basis of a professional chorus.
There was no money forthcoming from the Arts Council ("We used to apply every year, and one year we didn't apply at all, but the refusal came just the same!") but fund-raising concerts as a way of life, together with the support of Cork Corporation, helped O'Flynn and co-directors Eddie Malone and Jan Farmer keep things going for 12 years - years which saw 24 major productions at the Cork Opera House, a total of 95 operatic events and, eventually, Arts Council assistance.
By 1995, it was decided to make IORC the administrative arm of the newly formed Opera South, but after La Bohème and Il Trovatore, O'Flynn had begun to feel the pressure of his split-level life, especially as the Arts Council grant depended on the company matching the funds allocated to it.
"I was getting very, very tired. There was always the conflict between striving all the time for professional standards - insisting on them - yet constantly having to go down the amateur route in order to get finance. And we did get it - we closed both companies' credit, but I couldn't go on. I was aware that too many people of my age were dropping dead, and then there was no sense of nurturing, or that anyone cared what we were doing."
This is still the case: the new company's application to the Arts Council for €87,000 to meet an anticipated shortfall in next year's inaugural activities has been refused. So why start again? Perhaps part of the reasoning, or the provocation, can be explained by Dr Edward Walsh, president of Limerick University and one of the directors of the new company. "Having grown up in Cork, I've always believed that there's a special association between the city and the operatic tradition. One of my earliest memories is of Il Trovatore in the old Opera House. So when the call came to help with this project, I responded to it, although I agree that this is a bleak time for all the arts in Ireland, not just opera."
Walsh admits that the task is daunting, but having met the Cork city manager to discuss the positioning of the new opera company in the context of Capital of Culture 2005, he believes there is a civic enthusiasm for the project, the success of which will depend, he says, on the people of Cork themselves. If it works, it will fulfil the most important criterion for 2005, in that the seeds set then will grow to enrich the city afterwards.
This is also the criterion quoted by O'Flynn, who credits Gerry Barnes, managing director of the Cork Opera House, as the original motivating power. Barnes believed that Cork could not face into 2005 without an indigenous opera company. This time it has been formed in association with the Opera House, so its principles feel less isolated, despite the current climate. They are convinced that there is an appetite for opera in Cork - all the Ellen Kent opera visits are given to capacity houses - and that the people of the city and county deserve a company of their own.
The trouble is that the people of Cork are losing their touch or their taste for opera, according to the evidence of their behaviour on these occasional visits. For several years now, the Opera House has allowed patrons to bring their drinks into the auditorium, no matter what the event. Whole tray-loads of beers, wine and gins-and-tonics are ferried in (the glasses, thanks to insurance qualms, are usually plastic) by audiences unable to face any performance without liquid sustenance. O'Flynn, loyal as he is to the Opera House, can't defend this practice, but hopes Grand Opera will remind people of good manners.
It will be a learning process - just another one for O'Flynn, who is confident of his ability to call up an orchestra (probably the easiest requirement in Cork where the School of Music and UCC together are producing terrific young instrumentalists), guest conductors, soloists and choruses.
"This is only the beginning. I never said I wasn't crazy, but anything I've set out to do, I've done. There's a great team working in this house with Gerry Barnes, and together we'll put up something the city can be proud of. We want to set up a strong professional company, something that will last long after 2005.
"Opera never made financial sense, but in terms of life, of fun, guts, all the things that life's about - that's where it matters! If people are deprived of the opportunity to experience that . . . but they can't be deprived of it!"
Opera 2005 is organising a five-day Opera Tour to Kraków in Poland for performances of La Traviata and Nabucco, beginning on April 24th; details from 021-4543298
